Colonists dumped 92,000 pounds of tea into a harbor to protest a tax cut

In December 1773, colonists boarded three British ships in Boston Harbor and dumped 342 chests of tea into the water. Counterintuitively, they were protesting a tax break: the Tea Act had lowered tea's price while preserving Parliament's right to tax the colonies without their consent — a principle they refused to concede.

— Wikipedia contributors, Boston Tea Party — December 16, 1773