The Coercive Acts were meant to punish the Massachusetts colonists for their defiance. The legislation closed Boston Harbor, replaced Boston's elected leaders with those appointed by the Crown, and forced the quartering of British troops in private homes. In response to the Coercive Acts, the First Continental Congress met in 1774 to coordinate a protest which would escalate into the American Revolutionary War a few months later.

In response to the Coercive Acts, which were called the Intolerable Acts in the colonies, the First Continental Congress met in 1774 to coordinate a protest that would escalate, a few months later, into the American Revolutionary War.

The term "Boston Tea Party" did not appear in print until 1834. Before that time, the event was usually referred to simply as the "destruction of the tea".

In 2020, the Old South Association in Boston merged with the Bostonian Society, forming Revolutionary Spaces, which now manages both Old South Meeting House where protesters gathered before the original Boston Tea Party. Every December 16, more than 100 volunteers bring the historic event to life.

London's East India Company shipped the tea that was dumped in protest by the American colonists in 1773. Beginning in 2015, that same company began donating tea for the annual reenactment.