Watson Coleman: “Again, I listened to the words of my friend from Louisiana, where she made the comment that the only way a filibuster…”

“Again, I listened to the words of my friend from Louisiana, where she made the comment that the only way a filibuster survives is if it is the truth. I was reflecting on the history of filibusters. I read about it when I was a young man. Certainly preceding my youth, going back to the times of Harry Truman and FDR, unfortunately, there is a terrible history in this body of opposing efforts to provide civil rights opportunities, opposing efforts to ensure that there were antilynching statutes, opposing efforts to get rid of things like the poll tax. This is a sad part of the history of this body. I ask the distinguished chairman, who has a much better sense of history than I, is it true the tool that was used to oppose those efforts, oppose good things, the tool was the filibuster, and the filibuster did not represent the truth? Would that be a fair statement?”