The Intolerable Acts were the American Patriots ' term for a series of punitive laws passed by the British Parliament in 1774 after the Boston Tea party.They were meant to punish the Massachusetts colonists for their defiance in throwing a large tea shipment into Boston harbor.he Boston Port Act, the first of the acts passed in response to the Boston Tea Party, closed the port of Boston on June 1, 1774, until the East India Company had been repaid for the destroyed tea and until the king was satisfied that order had been restored.