- For the legislative tactic, see filibuster. A filibuster, or "talking out a bill", is a form of obstruction in a Legislature or other decision-making body
A filibuster is someone who engages in an unauthorized military expedition into a foreign country to foment or support a revolution. The term is usually used to describe United States citizens who attempted to foment insurrections in Latin America in the mid-19th century. The United States of America —commonly referred to as the Filibusters were irregular soldiers who acted without authority from their own government, and were usually motivated by financial gain, political ideology, or the thrill of adventure. Irregular military refers to any non-standard military Being defined by exclusion there is a lot of variance in what comes under the term The freewheeling actions of the filibusters led to the name being applied figuratively to the political act of filibustering in the U.S. Senate. A filibuster, or "talking out a bill", is a form of obstruction in a Legislature or other decision-making body The United States Senate is the Upper house of the bicameral United States Congress, the Lower house being the House of Representatives "Freebooter" is the more familiar term in European English, where "filibuster" normally refers to the legislative tactic.
The term came into English from the Spanish filibustero (meaning pirate or buccaneer, and ultimately coming from the Dutch vrijbuiter [freebooter]) and was first applied to persons raiding Spanish colonies and ships in the West Indies, the most famous of which was Sir Francis Drake with his 1573 raid on Nombre de Dios. English is a West Germanic language originating in England and is the First language for most people in the United Kingdom, the United States Piracy is Robbery committed at sea or sometimes on shore without a commission from a sovereign Nation (as distinct from Privateering The Caribbean (ˌkærəˡbiən kæ'rəbiən Cariben|Caraïben or Caraïben; Caraïbe or more commonly Antilles; Caribe is a Region consisting Sir Francis Drake, Vice Admiral, (c 1540 &ndash 27 January 1595 was an English Privateer, navigator, Slaver, and politician Nombre de Dios ("Name of God " is a city on the Atlantic coast of Panama in the Colon Province. With the end of the era of Caribbean piracy in the early 18th century the term fell out of general currency. The great era of Piracy in the Caribbean began in the 1560s and died out in the 1720s as the Nation-states of Western Europe with colonies in
The term was revived in the mid 19th century to describe the actions of adventurers who tried to take control of various Caribbean, Mexican, and Central-American territories by force of arms. The three most prominent filibusters of that era were William Walker, Narciso López, and John Quitman. William Walker ( May 8, 1824 &ndash September 12, 1860) was an American filibuster, adventurer and Mercenary Narciso López (1797&ndash1851 was an adventurer and soldier famous for his attempts to liberate Cuba from Spain in the 1850s John Anthony Quitman (b September 1 1799, Rhinebeck New York July 17 1858) was an American politician and soldier Although the American public often enjoyed reading about the thrilling adventures of filibusters, American citizens involved in filibustering expeditions were usually in violation of U. S. neutrality laws. For example, the journalist John L. O'Sullivan, who coined the related phrase "Manifest Destiny", was put on trial for raising money for Lopez's failed filibustering expedition in Cuba. John Louis O'Sullivan ( November 15, 1813 – March 24, 1895) was an American columnist and editor who used the term " Manifest Manifest Destiny was the belief that the United States was destined to expand from the Atlantic seaboard to the Pacific Ocean.
In the 1850s, William Walker attempted a filibustering campaign with a strategy involving his leading a private mercenary army. A mercenary is a person who takes part in an armed conflict who is not a national or a party to the conflict and is "motivated to take part in the hostilities essentially by In 1853, he unsuccessfully attempted to stage an insurrection in the Mexican states of Sonora and Baja California. Sonora is one of the 31 federal states of Mexico and is located in the northwest of the country Baja California (pronounced ˈbɑːhɑː kælɨˈfɔrnjə in English is the northernmost state of Mexico. Later, when a path through Lake Nicaragua was being considered as the possible site of a canal through Central America, he was hired as a mercenary by one of the factions in a civil war in Nicaragua. A civil war is a War between a State and domestic political actors that are in control of some part of the territory claimed by the state Nicaragua (ˌnɪkəˈrɑgwə officially the Republic of Nicaragua () is a representative democratic republic and the largest nation in Central America In 1856 he declared himself commander of the country's army and soon after President of the Republic. After attempting to take control of the rest of Central America and receiving no support from the U. S. government, he was defeated by the four other Central American nations he tried to invade and eventually executed by the local Honduran authorities he tried to overthrow. Honduras in Spanish, República de Honduras) is a democratic republic in Central America.
See also
References
- Brown, Charles H. This article discusses Aaron Burr (1756-1836 the US politician William Stephens Smith ( November 8, 1755 &ndash June 10, 1816) was a United States Representative from New York. Agents of Manifest Destiny: The Lives and Times of the Filibusters. University of North Carolina Press, 1980. ISBN 0-8078-1361-3.
- May, Robert E. "Manifest Destiny's Filibusters" in Sam W. Haynes and Christopher Morris, eds. Manifest Destiny and Empire: American Antebellum Expansionism. College Station, Texas: Texas A&M University Press, 1997. ISBN 0-89096-756-3.
- ———. Manifest Destiny's Underworld: Filibustering in Antebellum America. University of North Carolina Press, 2002. ISBN 0-8078-2703-7.
- Roche, James Jeffrey. The story of the Filibusters. 1891 [1]
External links
- Texas A & M Univ. on filibustering
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