What was the Tea Act?

The Tea Act (1773):
-allows the East India Tea Company to ship tea directly to America
-company has extra tea it cannot sell - some members of Parliament are stock holders
-gives the East India Company a monopoly
-actually it makes tea cheaper for the colonists (cheaper than smuggled Dutch tea)
-colonists feared that other English monopolies would start if this was allowed
-used of British tea implied that colonists agreed with England’s right to tax
-colonial merchants made no profit from tea sales
*In Mass. Meetings in Boston demanded that the governor send the tea back to England