We all know how much the American colonists loved their tea, but they didn’t want to have to pay a tax on it! So merchants began to conduct business with Holland to import tea that was cheaper and better-tasting than the tea the East India Company was selling. So smugglers began to import about 900,000 of Dutch tea each year! In addition, Americans also purchased 562,000 pounds of East India Tea. That’s a lot of tea! The Sons of Liberty greatly encouraged the colonists to drink the Dutch tea. This was their way of protesting the Townshend taxes.
