Tea off

Politics | Tax day parties protest $3 trillion in Obama-era spending | Lynn Vincent

Bill Greenblatt/ UPI/NewsCom

Angry citizens in February protested Congress' $790 billion stimulus bill with a series of Boston Tea Party-style tax revolts in a handful of cities from San Diego to Chicago. Now the idea is going national. Organizers in at least 34 states have planned April 15 "Tax Day" tea parties to protest $3 trillion in spending approved by Congress since President Obama took office.

In December 1773, a group of colonists called the Sons of Liberty stole aboard East India Company cargo ships moored in Boston Harbor and dumped nearly 90,000 pounds of tea into the sea. A major trigger for the American Revolution, the act was a direct protest to unfair tax policies levied against the colonies by the British government—including a measure that directly aided the financially distressed East India Company.