Re: Correction Regarding Tea Parties

[aburke5054@aol.com]

Framing the Boston Tea Party as an attack on "multinational 
corporations" is simply rewriting history to support your anti private 
school agenda.  Why you persist with this nonsense is beyond me.

Next stop:  Paul Revere's Ride was an attack on the transportation 
industry and the Declaration of Independence was really an attack on 
the Business Roundtable.

Art

-----Original Message-----
From: Scott Hays <shays@ccwebster.net>
To: arn-l@interversity.org
Sent: Tue, 1 Jan 2008 8:07 am
Subject: Re: [arn-l] Correction Regarding Tea Parties


A person on this list has tried to pretend that the Boston Tea Party 
was an expression of "liberty" and support for "private ownership" by 
American colonists because, as the story goes, they were upset at being 
taxed without proper representation in Parliament.  Though I have been 
persuaded by peers on this list from continuing to engage that 
individual in (mostly fruitless) discussion, I cannot allow this claim 
to go unchallenged.


The Tea Act of 1773 was not, as many confused by the shrouds of history 
contend, a "tax on tea".  It was, in fact, quite the opposite.  It 
eliminated the tax on tea charged to the East India Company and allowed 
that favored multi-national corporation to import tea to the American 
colonies duty-free.  This bit of legislation, in turn, was the direct 
result of actions of powerful lobbyists within Parliament who 
represented the East India Company (a corporation acting practically as 
a sovereign nation for 170 years) and sought to rescue it from certain 
bankruptcy arising from its imperialistic adventures and unjust 
land-use practices in the Punjab that culminated in a devastating 
famine that had the unexpected consequences of reducing tea production 
(interesting that even in the late 18th century, the influence of human 
political and economic activities on natural systems in distant parts 
of the world had outward-rippling effects that would shake the very 
foundations of that political and economic system) and thereby 
threatening sales in the European marketplace.


The Tea Act actually reduced the price of tea in the colonies, but the 
monopoly granted to a large multinational corporation (BEIC) served to 
undercut the lucrative tea importation business of the American 
merchant class.  One could easily argue that the Boston Tea Party was a 
revolt against an obvious example of the collusion between government 
and corporate power, and point to the long period of time in American 
history before "corporations" were allowed to be licensed for anything 
other than providing goods and services for the common good as a 
lasting legacy of that understanding.  Ironic that Adam Smith opposed 
the Tea Act and thought the East India Company required regulation (as 
opposed to treatment that gave it favored protections), while modern 
proponents of laissez-faire capitalism conveniently ignore the very 
same cozy relationship between governmental favoritism and corporate 
success while glibly proclaiming the supremacy of free and unregulated 
marketplaces (that do not exist).


Mr. Harttman is absolutely correct in his analysis of the rise of 
corporate power, and its cozy relationship with government.  The 
connecting point to this list and the interests we share has to do with 
privatization of publicly funded "corporations" ... a quaint (though 
central and very important) vestige of how private corporations once 
were formed and controlled in this country.  "Privatization" works to 
eliminate an equally quaint notion of something we used to refer to as 
the "common good".  Hence, the battles being fought over "public 
education" vs "private education" have much larger ramifications than 
many of us often give thought to.






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