So, why the name "filibuster"? We looked in the Merriam-Webster and American Heritage online dictionaries. A filibuster was someone involved in private military actions in foreign countries -- also known as a pirate. In Dutch the term for pirate meant freebooter. And a freebooter became a "filibustero" in Spanish. So when senators took control of the Senate floor, that was seen as acting like a filibuster.
IN THE NEWS, in VOA Special English, was written by Jerilyn Watson. Our reports are online at WWW.51VOA.COM. I'm Steve Ember.
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Sound from "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" is from http://www.americanrhetoric.com/.