Editing Filibuster (section)

==Etymology==
The term "filibuster" ultimately derives from the [[Dutch language|Dutch]] {{lang|nl|vrijbuiter}} ("freebooter", a [[pillaging]] and plundering adventurer), but the precise history of the word's borrowing into English is obscure.<ref name="OED">''Oxford English Dictionary'', "filibuster", pp. F:212–213.</ref> The ''[[Oxford English Dictionary]]'' finds its only known use in early modern English in a 1587 book describing "flibutors" who robbed supply convoys.<ref name="OED" />  In the late 18th century, the term was re-borrowed into English from its [[French language|French]] form {{lang|fr|flibustier}}, a form that was used until the mid-19th century.

The modern English form "filibuster" was borrowed in the early 1850s from the [[Spanish language|Spanish]] {{lang|es|filibustero}} (lawless plunderer).<ref>{{Cite news |last=Rizzo |first=Salvador |date=2021-03-22 |title=Analysis {{!}} Ed Markey's ahistorical attack on the filibuster |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/03/22/ed-markeys-ahistorical-attack-filibuster/ |access-date=2025-04-10 |newspaper=The Washington Post |language=en-US}}</ref> The term was applied to private military adventurers like [[William Walker (filibuster)|William Walker]] who were then attacking and pillaging Spanish colonies in [[Central America]].<ref name="OED" />  Spain lost all its Central American territory in 1821.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Fouts |first=Michael |date=2017-12-13 |title=No Spain, No Gain |url=https://www.ohiohistory.org/no-spain-no-gain/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230118233544/https://www.ohiohistory.org/no-spain-no-gain/ |archive-date=2023-01-18 |access-date=2023-01-18 |website=Ohio History Connection}}</ref>  Over the course of the mid to late 19th century, the term "filibustering" became common in American English in the sense of "obstructing progress in a legislative assembly".<ref name="OED" />