The Sons Of Liberty: The Tea Tax

The tax placed on tea by the British was a way to help the East India tea company, and it was politically significant. The Americans, at the time, had just had the Townshend acts repealed on common items such as glass, paper, and etc. however they were not satisfied until all taxes had been removed. This tax was barely anything for an average American. The Englishman who had maybe half an acre of land was not generating much revenue yet he or she willingly paid taxes of 50% of their profit. The colonist was more lucrative because he had hundreds of times the land a common farmer in England had, and even then, American soil was more fertile. The Americans had Britain repeal all of the major taxes, and all that was left was the tea tax which …show more content…
The Sons of Liberty stressed the symbolic significance of the tax, and that they are being controlled by the British. The common folk were not really affected by the tax, but they were being influenced by the ideals behind the tax. The upper class called for a boycott of tea, and that worked well with the lower class because they did not have the wealth to participate in the British ritual of tea time, one with “an array of fancy crockery and silver utensils.” The less wealthy despised the ritual of tea time since it was high-end, and when a boycott came along, they were happy to join because it makes them more similar to the wealthy than less; it soothed their resentment of class disparity. Through the manipulation of the lower class, the Sons of Liberty helped to ignite further resentment of the …show more content…
John Adams seemed intrigued by the incident, and he acknowledged that this a major blow to Britain since the colonists of Boston destroyed their tea. This was the first time the colonists destroyed Britain’s property; in the past, colonists would boycott or would burn buildings, but that was all of colonies’ property. George Washington, among several others, “chided Bostonians for ‘their conduct in destroying tea’.” Many feared the power of the British Government, and the wrath that they would face. Few colonists at the time wanted a separation from Britain since they only wanted the taxes to be alleviated, and they feared they would get a strong response from Britain back; indeed they did. Britain passed the coercive acts in order to restrict the colonists, but the British fell right into the Sons of Liberties’ hand; the Sons of Liberty were a radical group that advocated for separation from the British Empire. The coercive acts gave them something to propagandize; the group emphasized the cruelty of the British, and the colonists became more open to the idea of freedom. Many people did not support the Boston Tea Party because of the effects it may have, and when effect took place, it was manipulated to help further separation from Britain by demonstrating the unjustness of