Glossary term
Intolerable Acts
1774 British laws punishing Massachusetts after the Boston Tea Party.
Historical context
The Intolerable Acts, sometimes referred to as the Insufferable Acts or Coercive Acts, were a series of five punitive laws passed by the British Parliament in 1774 after the Boston Tea Party. The laws aimed to collectively punish Massachusetts colonists for the actions of those protesting the Tea Act, a tax measure enacted by Parliament in May 1773, by dumping tea into Boston harbor.