Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Law

January 2009

Category naming

There is currently a discussion on the naming of the sub-categories to Category:United States Attorneys at CFD here. Pleas chime in if you can so we can get a consensus. Aboutmovies (talk) 07:49, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Notability of cases and doctrines

There have been a couple of attempts to spark discussion on notability guidelines for legal topics in the past, but none came to anything resembling a conclusion. I nominated Moorov v HMA for deletion as non-notable, and regardless of the outcome of that discussion, wanted to know if there was anything approaching a consensus on useful notability criteria for cases and doctrines arising from cases (I won't further distinguish between these two ideas in this note).

I do not think that it would be the least bit useful to have an article on every appelate case that has been discussed in a casebook or law review article. Yet a simple reading of the WP:GNG could lead to a presumption that articles on every such case would withstand nomination for deletion.

Any thoughts? Bongomatic 00:54, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Law review articles may be stretching it, but it is useful for us to have an entry on any appellate case that appears in a casebook, as that makes us a resource for tens of thousands of law students to turn to on a regular basis. There number of law review articles vastly exceeds the number of casebooks, after all, and an article on an obscure topic may cite a minor case for a minor point. However, a case that generates an article which is predominately about that case is likely sufficiently notable to merit inclusion, as is a case that is referenced in a substantial number of articles (say, a half-dozen or more by different authors). Since Wikipedia is a volunteer project, it does not hurt the encyclopedia to host such things. bd2412 T 02:31, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Interesting perspective, but I don't agree with all of what you say. From a practical perspective, having cases and what they stand for in Wikipedia seems like a bad idea--cases are overruled or supported frequently and in multiple courts, and it is the job of Westlaw and Lexis/Nexis, etc. to keep current on this, and the idea that Wikipedia could be current or accurate broadly on such a technical, enormous, and frequently changing field of information is not credible.

Notwithsntanding WP:NOTPAPER (which on its own has never struck me as a suitable reason for inclusion), there are numerous cases in casebooks that do not belong in an encyclopedia. Wikipedia is not meant to be a practitioner's guide.

On the other hand, for "landmark" cases whose status is stable or would be widely reported if they were to change (Raffles v Wichelhaus, Marbury v. Madison, Bowers v. Hardwick) seem like obvious candidates for inclusion.

If the whole world other than me thinks that every case in a casebook, or every case that is the main topic of a law review article merits inclusion, so be it. But does anyone have any more nuanced views in between that and this alternative: that only cases given significant coverage in reliable non-technical sources that are independent from the subject be included?

I am not making that argument (though I may later if no suggestions that seem better come forth), but am advancing it in order to get some alternative views. Bongomatic 04:09, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

My own personal interest in law is as part of history. I think every case that gets decided by the final court of appellate jurisdiction in a common law country is notable--at least in the modern era, where only the most important cases reach there,

Sorry to interrupt, but I don't think this is accurate. Cases where there are disagreements among circuits or cases for which the high court has original jurisdiction also get there. Bongomatic 08:20, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

and they are there because for the most part as a result of major public questions--both the H of Lords and the US SC are extremely selective in what they accept.

They may be selective, but their selection critera are not the same as the criteria for notability in respect of inclusion in an encyclopedia. For example, in Allen v. Siebert, the court (from my reading of the synopsis) was emphasizing what appears to be an obvious point that was ignored by an impudent appelate court below. I only had to get to #2 on this list. Bongomatic 08:20, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

we're providing information for general readers, not law students, and I think anything there qualifies as being of such interest. I am not sure how to apply this to earlier years, where many cases even at that level give me at least as an untutored person the appearance of being fairly routine--certainly the ones that reach casebooks are not routine, being the basic precedents.

Lots of cases that are not of general interest (normally defined) reach casebooks. This happens for a variety of reasons, including cases that non-uniquely stand for a principle, or cases that stand for a minor principle, twist on a principle, or occasional exception to a principle. Such cases would be notable (if at all) only in the context of the principle at issue. Bongomatic 08:20, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

I don't mean that only such cases should be included, but that others should be selective. Certainly the ones in casebooks, which are highly selected, should be included, as recognized precedents. The standard of being widely cited in the literature applies--citation indexes, after all, were developed for law centuries before Garfield developed them for the sciences.

Nor do I know how to extend this to other legal systems, where the impact of an individual case is not so great. I think we'd have to go with the ones notable by their system of instruction & ones to which there are historical references.

as for legal doctrines as such, I think a lot is to be gained by consolidation into combination articles for all but the most notable. Again, the most notable, being the most referred to in history, politics, literature, or popular knowledge. DGG (talk) 04:39, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Agree with this last bit . . . that notability of doctrines should be based on thier reference in non-technical sources. Just think that the cases should equally be treated this way. De facto inclusion is for almanacs, not encyclopedias. Bongomatic 08:20, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

I think the general WP:N is sufficient. And under those guidelines, certainly any SCOTUS case (and equivalent in other countries) would meet that threshold.

This is not accurate if you take away technical sources (as a review of cases in the the above-mentioned list demonstrates, some SCOTUS cases are not given significant coverage in such sources), and in any event doesn't give rise to an automatic presumption. Bongomatic 08:20, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Thus it is accurate since we don't remove "technical sources" (by which I assume you mean law journals). A RS is a RS regardless of if its technical or not. Per WP:RS: "their authors are generally regarded as trustworthy or authoritative in relation to the subject at hand" so in a way, we want to use law journals as sources. As someone responsible for the website for an online law school based law journal, EVERY case that SCOTUS decides gets three write ups for us (cert, oral, decision), and I'm sure other journals cover their cases as well. And they are independent, and there is substantial coverage. Thus it meets N. (Plus as I said CNN usually has a write up, and I know with Oregon related ones the state-wide paper usually has a write up when it is granted cert and again when it is decided and would guess the same is done by many other papers). Notability is not universal or even world-wide or country-wide notability. Notability is notability, regardless of if it is of a regional or national basis, or even of specialized interest. I and I would assume most people could care less about 90% of the content on Wikipedia (2.6 million articles or so), as it is not notable to me. Who was the MP from X district in England in year XXXX does nothing for me. The latest cases out of the UK do nothing for me. But each is notable in their own right in those locations. Next, there is a problem with your argument above about your list and #2 regarding Allen v. Siebert. There is no article on the case. And notability guidelines only apply to stand-alone articles, "but do not directly limit the content of articles." Aboutmovies (talk) 09:28, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

There are hundreds of law journals out there, just as there are journals for other areas such as biology and the like, and I would venture every SCOTUS case that gets decided will have at least one article on just that article, not to mention the regular press coverage the cases receive (I believe CNN does a story on just about everyone of them). Below that, a fair amount of U.S. Federal COA cases make the regular news (such as the pledge of allegiance case a few years back from the 9th) and many more end up in law review articles and in text books. Same with state supreme court and appellate court cases. But you get a decidedly lower number number of each as you go down the food chain. You will even have some decisions from trial courts that make the news and make it into text books. But with all of them, if there is substantial coverage from multiple sources, then it passes WP:N and should be included. This means almost any case in a textbook that is covered, that is not just mentioned or is in the notes as an after thought (i.e. it would not meet the substantial coverage requirement).

This conclusion avoids the discussion on the assumption that at least one person (me) thinks is desirable. You are saying that "because it's covered in a casebook, which is a reliable source, it's notable", while I'm asking, "for the purpose of establishing what we think of as notability for the purpose of inclusion in WP, is coverage in a casebook really a good indicator"? (And further, I think "no"). Bongomatic 08:20, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

No, that is not what I said. I said "almost". Not in every instance, but if it is in a case book, that is strong evidence that it is notable. There are usually many case books on a subject, and they will often repeat the same cases. Thus, if it then reaches the multiple sources, then it then meets WP:N. But remember, if it is in a case book, that means someone has taken note of the subject. Aboutmovies (talk) 09:28, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

As to the notion of its not a practitioner's guide, most cases are of interest to legal folks, but many are also of interest to regular folks.

Yes, but many are not, and I'm suggesting that we try to come up with a practical and way of delineating the boundaries between those that are and aren't. If a de facto test is arrived at, you can count on someone starting 100,000 useless stubs that are never going to be filled in--not because nobody has time, but because so many of the cases will be of no interest to anyone. I don't see how this serves any users of WP. Bongomatic 08:20, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

We already have 100,000 useless stubs that are never going to be filled in on a variety of topics (varies on what you find important). I think this highlights why the notability standards are what they are, and should remain as they are. The guideline attempts to be objective, and you are trying to make it subjective by tying who they are notable to. This is a bad idea as it would lead to many existing articles being deleted because they are not notable to some group of people. Who are we to decide what case is of interest to who? And further, you seem to think cases that are of interest to only legal types should not be included, why? Are they second class citizens who should not have their area of interest covered as thoroughly as say a complete detailed guide to every episode of The Simpsons? Or maybe we should also exclude other minority views too. Aboutmovies (talk) 09:28, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

And though most on Wikipedia are written like law review articles, that simply means they are of poor quality by Wikipedia standards and need to be wikified, not deleted. Further, I have little interest in advanced physics as well as little interest in the politics of Angola, and I would venture that most readers are likely the same. But we still have these topics because they pass the notability standards, and because some people are interested in the topic. Notability standards are not meant to keep out articles about things people haven't heard of or have little interest in (because these are far too subjective), they are mainly meant to prevent hoaxes and to ensure there are RS available to properly cover the topic.

Lastly, as to keeping them up to date, this is not really a concern. Any lawyer using Wikipedia instead of properly Shepardizing a case would likely face bar sanctions and maybe a malpractice suit. Plus, we cover many things that need updating, such as who is the head of state for every country, who is the mayor of every city, what treatments are used for what, who won what Golden Globe, etc. But we still cover those topics. Further, a good article about a case is an encyclopedic article and covers what the case stood for when decided, not necessarily what precedential value it now has, as that is not the purpose of Wikipedia. We don't have headnotes, or multi-colored flags, those are the domain of legal publications. Wikipedia provides a basic knowledge perspective and then gives you the list of resources to go better research a topic. And frankly, as an elementary school student we were told we could not use encyclopedias as sources for any papers, we could only use them to get a basic understanding of the topic and for locating other sources. The same thing for law school. Thus anyone who uses Wikipedia as their primary resource for a topic gets an F in my book. Aboutmovies (talk) 07:17, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

See comments above to DGG in addition to inline relplies. Bongomatic 08:21, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

I have thought this over in light of my current casebook reading, which is on Food & Drug Law, and which contains a series of Court of Appeals cases presented as examples of what level of adulteration or decomposition the FDA can cite as a reason to condemn food. I will grant that most of these cases are not worthy of an article, as they are very short and simply recite the law rather than resolving some unusual question. Other texts on the subject likely contain similar cases, but not the same choices. I would say that the inclusion of the same case in two or more textbooks indicates that it is sufficiently notable to merit inclusion in the encyclopedia. As I said above, a case that generates a law review article which is predominately about that case, or which is referenced in a half-dozen articles by different authors, should be deemed notable. Of course, appellate cases that receive substantial coverage in news media are likely notable as well. Not to overly complicate things, but I propose the following point system:

A case will need ten points to be deemed sufficiently notable to merit inclusion.

Reproduction in a casebook is worth five points.

Mention as a note case in a casebook is worth two points.

Being the subject of a law review article is worth five points.

Being referenced in a law review is worth two points.

Being the subject of a substantial news story is worth five points.

Being mentioned in a news story is worth two points.

Being cited as authority by the national Supreme Court in an unrelated case is worth one point.

That's the package, I think. Cheers! bd2412 T 15:17, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Interesting. I've toyed with a point system for regular notability based on level of coverage in the source and how "popular" a source is. For instance lots of points for an article all about the subject in USA Today, not so many if it is in the local small town paper. But I think it ends up too mechanical for many people. Though I will say I would suggest a change of your 2 pointers to 1 point as you can get lots of cases mentioned with nothing more than a citation, but add a 3 pointer for if the case receives at least one paragraph of coverage, or something along those lines. This helps make it much more difficult if it is trivial coverage, while making it still possible for the instances where though the coverage isn't substantial, it is more than trivial. Aboutmovies (talk) 09:37, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

I see your point. Get it? Point. Heh heh... ahem, well I agree with that division of mentions - one point for a mere mention (in a newspaper or a law review article), three points for a full paragraph. Also, if I did not underscore it enough above, only references by different authors should count. So, if the case is in both a casebook and a law review article, but by the same author, no additional points for the law review because that does not reflect a broad opinion of the importance of the case. bd2412 T 14:33, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Law/United States federal judges

For anyone who is interested in working on this, I've put together a list of everyone who has ever served as a U.S. district court, circuit court, or court of appeals judges here. The list is chock full of red links, of course, but the articles should be easy to assemble from information in the biographical database of the Federal Judicial Center, available here. Many of these can probably be solved with redirects as well. Do not trust all the blue links, some are other people with the same names. Cheers! bd2412 T 16:45, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

• Also, I have begun adding succession boxes to the biographies of all federal judges. bd2412 T 00:57, 20 January 2009 (UTC)
  • I am moving this project to the newly created Wikipedia:WikiProject United States courts and judges. bd2412 T 20:03, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

MfD nomination of Wikipedia:Legal Debate

Wikipedia:Legal Debate, a page you substantially contributed to, has been nominated for deletion. Your opinions on the matter are welcome; please participate in the discussion by adding your comments at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Legal Debate and please be sure to sign your comments with four tildes (~~~~). You are free to edit the content of Wikipedia:Legal Debate during the discussion but should not remove the miscellany for deletion template from the top of the page; such a removal will not end the deletion discussion. Thank you. Eastlaw ^talk · _contribs 10:39, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Constitution Act 1986 (New Zealand)

Could I have some opinions please on the matter under discussion at Talk:Constitution Act 1986, which has now spread to Talk:Independence of New Zealand.-gadfium 06:47, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

February 2009

Receivership and receiver (legal)

There is a request for a merger, they are not very big articles and I have volunteered to do the merging but they are Wikiproject:Law articles so if it's important say so. ~ R.T.G 01:55, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

I completely agree with this merger. bd2412 T 04:26, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

New to the project

I have created two articles, HM Advocate v Ross and Brennan v HM Advocate. Can someone please check them out? I thought I was writing them according to Wikipedia standards, but somebody placed this big tag on it about 'notability' which I don't quite understand.--I Really Love You, And I Mean You (talk) 15:55, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

Add more of the kind of reference that I have added to Ross v H.M. Advocate - you can not merely say that it is important, but must show that it is by reference to other publications which say so. Cheers! bd2412 T 22:04, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

LawNix and free knowledge

Hello everyone. Can I alert you all to the practice of this profit making website, "LawNix", which is pasting its own references to cases into pages here on Wikipedia. I always delete them when I see them, and I'd like to ask that you do to. LawNix is a profit making venture, through Googleads. It does not appear to be very reliable, and it's just a cheap, nasty form of learning which is probably used by young law students far too much. More importantly, Wikipedia should not serve as a place for people to advertise their commercial products - Wikipedia should definitely not encourage people to look at dodgy commercial products. So please do delete any such "external links" that you find. :) Wikidea 14:59, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

There is a way to have external links blacklisted, so that an addition of the link can not be saved at all. See Wikipedia:Spam blacklist. Cheers! bd2412 T 18:58, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

What are the specific edits being complained of? I'd not previously heard of Lawnix, but I just took a look at its website, http://www.lawnix.com/, and I don't see any reason to categorically ban links to it. For example, it has text of cases that, if referenced in an article, are worth linking to. The briefs, while intended to be law school briefs, also appear, on a quick sampling, to be cogent summaries of the cases they discuss. Links to their blog and to their course outlines would, of source, be in appropriate.

Wikipedia links to many commercial sites, and as far as I'm aware, the commercial nature of a site is not a reason to bar its inclusion. We include, for example, links to findlaw.com, despite that being a commercial site. As long as it stays on the right side of WP:LINKSPAM (which I can't form an opinion on in this case, not having seen the edits complained of), there's no bar to linking to a commercial site. TJRC (talk) 19:33, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

I'll add my two cents to stick up for lawnix. I didn't know about the site when I was a 1L. I wish I had. I learned about it when I joined law review. This is THE go-to site for quick refreshers on important 1L cases. It serves a different role than Wikipedia because case briefs are not in an encyclopedia-type format. The ads are subtle and text-only. Findlaw on the other hand displays large picture ads and has much more of a "dodgy commercial product" look and feel. If you systematically purge links to lawnix you will be doing a great disservice. You should also apply your criteria impartially and purge links to findlaw and other such sites. TwoEll (talk) 14:11, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

You'll have to forgive me for being suspicious of this comment being your only contribution to Wikipedia. bd2412 T 17:50, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

(judge) or (jurist)

We have a large number of articles which disambiguate common names by indicating that the subject is Joe Smith (judge) or Joe Smith (jurist). I feel that we should try to go with one or the other, and would like to know if anyone has a preference between them (or a reason why we should use both in different cases). Also, should we have guidelines on how much of a person's career should be occupied on the bench before we use either? bd2412 T 03:17, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

Wow, it may be a title of prestige but I thought you were being silly and mixing up the judge with the jury. No legal background and non-American (God help me) Jurist says it is not specific to judiciary, but to law in learning and equally correct as Jurisconsult. ~ R.T.G 13:38, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

That would be (juror), although I doubt there are many people famous enough for being a juror that their article would contain this parenthetical. But between (judge) and (jurist), it would seem to me that (judge) is more descriptive of a profession. bd2412 T 05:08, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

If no one objects, I am going to start moving (jurist) entries to (judge), unless the subject is distinctly noted as a jurist (i.e. an expert on the law apart from having a judicial role). Cheers! bd2412 T

Why is Scots law based upon Roman law?

A discussion on the origins of the Scottish legal system is taking place at WikiProject Scotland. Editors of this article may be able to throw light on the topic. To contribute to the discussion, please click here. References, per WP:VERIFY, would be especially welcome! Thank you in advance. --Mais oui! (talk) 08:29, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

Added template to Ex post facto law article

Link Ex post facto law. One of those funny things you comes across, the only WP tagged for that article was Human Rights. I hope it's obvious why I included the article in this wikiproject. I did not declare quality or importance, though the latter probably should be top. Please take a look. IMHO (talk) 20:40, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

Competition law

Competition law (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Can I get some eyes at competition law? I've identified 40 separate factual and POV and style problems with the article, but an editor who has ownership problems is refusing to collaborate on the talk page, or even to permit the article to be tagged, on the grounds that he doesn't like me. THF (talk) 15:15, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

Added Crimes against humanity article

Link Crimes against humanity. Aside from the fact that any international law article is by nature a law article, a number of states incorporate crimes against humanity into their domestic law. Please visit the article and grade quality and importance. IMHO (talk) 02:15, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Ages of consent in North America

I'm currently experiencing some problems here because people are taking a bit TOO much initiative and splitting off the United States section, and then someone followed suit and split off the Canadian section in a bad way. I've reported the latter in the WikiProject Canadian Law, but I can't find one for US law so I'm posting it here so if someone knows please relay it there. We need to foster discussion about this. I personally think it actually is growing a bit big and a split wouldn't be the most horrible thing. This isn't merely a case of Americentric editing (though I'm not surprised if it's what the most legal info is compiled about) but rather, the individual laws that each state has regarding sexual consent (as opposed to a universal federal law in the case of most other countries) it simply takes up a very large amount of room. Another country which could end up this way if we ended up having info on it would be Japan seeing as how it has both a national minimum, and then higher numbers for the different prefectures, which have independant laws just like the American states do. So, if we can get info on that (interwiki with wikipedia.jp?) then if America gets its own I propose Japan gets its own following that. Tyciol (talk) 07:01, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Saxbe fix

This year marks the 100th anniversary of the first Saxbe fix, which became effective on March 4, 1909 and facilitated a March 6, 1909 appointment. I have been trying to get this through the WP:FAC process so that I can propose it at WP:TFAR to be a WP:TFA. Because of its centennary and its membership in an underrepresented category of articles, it would have extremely high priority and almost assuredly be approved for the main page on either the 4th or the 6th if it is promoted to WP:FA. I intend to renominate it at WP:FAC in five to seven days for one final attempt at FA promotion. The article could use any assistance that you may be able to lend in terms of copyediting so that it represents the best of WP. This is your chance to get invovled not only in a FA if we get this cleaned up, but an FA that would surely go to the main page. Please come help clean this up. Also, any details on the Hilda Solis fix that you may be able to find to properly cite that eventuality would also be helpful.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 19:50, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

At the risk of sounding too harsh, I'm going to offer my opinion candidly. In my opinion the Saxbe fix article would need a lot of work before it would merit the distinction of becoming a FA. Considering the serious ownership problems that are evident from examining the revision history, I don't think this is going to happen in the near to intermediate future. I think it is a waste of effort for anyone to try to improve it since someone will merely revert it. JaDcam (talk) 12:04, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Feel free to revisit the ownership in the history. Note that at least five editors have over ten edits on the article in the last week or so. Commentary welcome at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Saxbe fix.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 23:39, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Receivership and Administrative receivership

Hi, I have completed the merger of Receivership and Receiver (legal). It has been suggested that Administrative receivership should also be merged to Receivership. It is basically the same thing, yes? ~ R.T.G 14:43, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree with this merger as well. The combination of these entries will yield a single, far more comprehensive and useful piece on receivership in its various formulations. bd2412 T 17:52, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Seconded. Administrative receivership cries out to be a "United Kingdom process" section in Receivership. TJRC (talk) 18:21, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Ok, I will have a go at that now ~ R.T.G 15:17, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Request for comment from an expert on UK computer misuse law

I've highlighted something I believe is a misinterpretation of the law at Talk:Copyright infringement#Computer misuse act!?, and would appreciate comment from somebody who knows the subject better than I do. JulesH (talk) 18:04, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Varian v. Delfino

• Varian v. Delfino (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Ronald M. Whyte (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Jack Komar (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Crisler (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Suebenjamin (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Amberjacker (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

An anon editor is edit-warring to return unsourced material about living people. Sources are likely available, but the article is very much a one-sided affair that needs work.

User:Crisler works on two types of articles -- those relating to this lawsuit, and those relating to the death penalty. The article is awfully favorable to the respondents in Varian v. Delfino, and, coincidentally, the respondents in that case have since written annual guides to the death penalty. "Crisler" is the last name of the human resources officer at Varian whom Delfino and Day had their litigious dispute with.

User:Suebenjamin and User:Amberjacker also only write about this lawsuit, and use the same unusual edit-summary style as Crisler.

(Coincidentally, or not so coincidentally, the litigation involved a corporation overreacting to sockpuppet behavior by ex-employees on Internet message boards.)

The possible WP:COI and WP:SOCK problem bothers me less than the WP:NPOV issue; the article, about a minor California Supreme Court case of little precedential value that arguably flunks WP:NOTNEWS, needs a rewrite, as does the BLP article about Judges Whyte and Komar.

I'd clean this up myself, except I was classmates with one of the attorneys who had the misfortune of having to litigate this case, and I'm trying to steer clear of COI allegations myself. THF (talk) 11:46, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

New article

Hey guys, I created an article on Rivera_v._Illinois. It's currently an orphan and probably doesn't meet all the formatting requirements you guys have for law articles. I've got the ball rolling though, so if you want to pitch in, thanks in advance. Chicken Wing (talk) 16:45, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Tim Howard (attorney)

Lawyers needed to eyeball an autobiography that survived AFD. THF (talk) 11:47, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals#Wikiproject United States courts and judges

I have proposed, at Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals#Wikiproject United States courts and judges, to break out a new project just on United States courts and judges. Please visit and comment. Cheers! bd2412 T 03:57, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Natural born citizen of the United States‎‎

There is a non-trivial dispute going on at Natural born citizen of the United States over the content of the article. People interested in this topic who are not already following the matter might want to go have a look at this article's revision history and talk page. Richwales (talk) 15:38, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Fundamental rights deletion-by-redirect

The article Fundamental right is tagged as being of high importance within your project on its talk page. Despite this fact, Hauskalainen (talk · contribs · count · logs · page moves · block log) (also current wqa) and Buridan (talk · contribs · count · logs · page moves · block log) have made several attempts to redirect it to other tangentially related topics. Both seem to think it better to make the article go away than to actively encourage anyone to fix it (see their comments and mine at Talk:Fundamental right#Remove reference to the European Union. Merge article with other long standing articles on the topic and Talk:Universal Declaration of Human Rights#Merger with Fundamental Rights). I have neither the time nor the expertise to deal with this article more directly than I already have right now, quite aside from the fact that two users can easily out-revert one, especially when the two are each on track to set personal monthly editcount records. Thus, I bring this to your attention in the hope that, if you truly find the article to be that important, some one or more of you who know more about it than I do can make the changes necessary to achieve WP:CON on this issue. I have posted this same notice at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Philosophy, and made note of it at Talk:Fundamental right. --KGF0 ( T | C ) 21:46, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

everything is fine now, the issue with fundamental right.... was that it was a stub with a list of wikilinks, that otherwise had no verifiable content. i redirected it to human rights, which has the same comment, mostly verified. I wouldn't call it tangentially related, nor did i make several attempts. i redirected it once to human rights, after the gentleman above took off a redirect which was set to udhr, which was a misconceived redirect. And i am no where near setting a personal editcount record. Back in 2006.... well.....--Buridan (talk) 13:58, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

I dispute Buridan's definition of "fine." I believe Buridan is confused as to the difference between "unverifiable" (cannot be done) and "unverified" (hasn't been done yet). I am convinced that Buridan neither knows nor cares about fine-line legal distinctions between topics such as fundamental rights and human rights. And finally, not that it matters, it's clear that Buridan hasn't actually checked the editcount, which shows 213 edits this month: indeed a new personal record. --KGF0 ( T | C ) 23:50, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

it is also clear that i wouldn't actually check an edit count as it is fairly meaningless, though it does say something about my procrastination. if there is a fundamental right, that is not a human right, feel free to merge it.--Buridan (talk) 00:11, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

I think this redirect was a mistake. It's not that there are fundamental rights which aren't human rights; but not all "human rights" are "fundamental rights." It is a distinct legal doctrine, the subject of millions of gallons of spilled ink. Does this not justify the separation of the articles? I for one, would be willing to add several hundred words of copy if we could undo this blunder.Non Curat Lex (talk) 01:21, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree that having a redirect rather than an article is a mistake, and I'll fully support you in returning it to article status (I'll be happy to chip in as well). bd2412 T 01:52, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

BD - always the voice of reason. Non Curat Lex (talk) 09:14, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

[-unindent-] I have restored the article and made some changes to clear up the proper focus thereof I can't do any more on it rght now, and some of what I have added violates NOR and SYN, so help is requested. Non Curat Lex (talk) 06:07, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Coordinators' working group

Hi! I'd like to draw your attention to the new WikiProject coordinators' working group, an effort to bring both official and unofficial WikiProject coordinators together so that the projects can more easily develop consensus and collaborate. This group has been created after discussion regarding possible changes to the A-Class review system, and that may be one of the first things discussed by interested coordinators.

All designated project coordinators are invited to join this working group. If your project hasn't formally designated any editors as coordinators, but you are someone who regularly deals with coordination tasks in the project, please feel free to join as well. — Delievered by §hepBot (Disable) on behalf of the WikiProject coordinators' working group at 05:49, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

March 2009

Birthright citizenship in the United States of America

There are non-trivial disputes going on at Birthright citizenship in the United States of America over the content of the article and the appropriate use of certain sources. People interested in this topic who are not already following the current controversies might want to go have a look at recent developments in this article's revision history and on its talk page. Richwales (talk) 17:09, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Treaty title guidelines?

Are there established guidelines for treaty titles? In the Pacific Northwest alone I know of teh Hay-Herbert Treaty (aka the Alaska boundary settlement/treaty), the Russo-American Treaty of 1824, its counterpart the Anglo-Russian Convention of 1825, aka the Treaty of Saint Petersburg (1825), the Russo-British/Anglo-Russian Convention of 1839 (no article yet, deliberating on title), the Treaty of Washington (1846), aka the Oregon Treaty, and the Treaty of Washington (1871) (which ended the San Juan Island dispute and also established/guaranteed British navigation rights on the Yukon River (and I think guaranteed British access to the Stikine River, which the US had challenged after buying Alaska. This seems to be the only WP where international law titles might have any sort of regular guideline, unless there's some area of WP:History covering diplomatic history. Any suggestions on standards for titles, or is it a free-for-all? If not, then I cant htink of a good dozen treaties whose titles might need eradjusting to fit whatever is the correct format.....Skookum1 (talk) 00:31, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

FAR notification for Dietrich v The Queen

I have nominated Dietrich v The Queen for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. D.M.N. (talk) 16:23, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Law

There are several pending AFD nominations where some editors are claiming that an attorney's name on a filed brief or listed in a Westlaw opinion as one of several attorneys on record is the sort of verifiable reliable source that conveys notability. This would imply that nearly every litigator in the United States satisfies WP:N. If you have an opinion on this issue, you may wish to comment on these pending nominations. THF (talk) 12:58, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Barrett v. Rosenthal

I would love for members of this WikiProject to check out this article for various reasons, but mostly because an editor is currently arguing that we cannot use primary sources in the form of legal documents and court records as sources in the article because it violates WP:BLP. Whether you agree or disagree, I'd love some input about this on the talk page, and about any other issues you may have with the article. Thanks! -- Levine2112 ^discuss 17:16, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

I looked at it and rated it C class. Bearian (talk) 20:11, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

Wikify Economic Recovery and Middle-Class Tax Relief Act of 2009

Could someone take a look at this article? It keeps some help in its stucture, maybe some more content. Not my area of expertise. Sephiroth storm (talk) 20:02, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Lydia Foy

Help please.

I've created Lydia Foy, and I'm developing it.

• Should it be renamed to Foy v An t-. Ard Chlaraitheoir?
• I've been in email contact with the FLAC lawyer representing Ms Foy. His comments were uncritical and positive, he welcomes the article. He brought a few minor corrections and updates to my attention, which I am addressing (with suitable WP:RS, I'm not depending on him as a source). He politely requested that the first names of Ms Foys' former partner and her children be removed - but he acknowledged that he could not insist upon it. He would prefer to retain their privacy. The names are easily found via google from WP:RS. I'm not sure if the names add to the article, so ask here, do you think they should go? Personally, I think the names of the children could be removed without much impact, but I'd keep the partners name, as it makes the prose better.

Any other help, comments, criticism would be welcome. (Please edit it if you can improve it)

Thanks, --  Chzz  ►  16:55, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

I think the article is correctly entitled. Nothing appears prima facie out of sorts. Bearian (talk) 20:04, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

Article alerts

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Thanks. — Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 09:20, 15 March, 2009 (UTC)

Stem cell laws

I'd like to start drafting an article about "Stem cell laws". Is that the best name, or would something along the lines of "Law fo stem cells"? Should I complete as much as possible in my user space, or open it up ASAP? How controversial would it be? How broad or narrow should it be? What links are essential? Is it notable, or would it be too much "list-cruft"? Bearian (talk) 20:02, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

Kumin Sommers LLP

Hi guys, take a look at this one. I've blanked the page because it was spammy, because I got 0 Google hits indicative of notability, and because I couldn't find references to reliable sources on the company's web page. However, I declined the speedy deletion because I have a feeling people in the company could come up with newspaper articles establishing notability if they worked at it. - Dan Dank55 (push to talk) 02:06, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

I would have left it speedied. As you note, it was spammy with no assertion of notability. If it later turns out to be notable, itd pretty much have to be rewritten from the ground up, anyway. TJRC (talk) 05:06, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

I didn't get any quick response from the creator, so I've taken this to AfD. If another admin had speedied this article, I'd have no objection at all, that's by-the-book. The reason for not speedying this is that when I read their website, I get the feeling that there are probably 200 newspaper articles out there that would help to establish notability for the firm; they just didn't know that that's what we needed. - Dan Dank55 (push to talk) 14:53, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

I may be missing something, but as I read it, the page as it existed before you blanked it was marked for speedy deletion. See [1]. What I mean by my comment above is that I would have it subject to the speedy rather than blanking it. TJRC (talk) 17:04, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

You're right, it was marked for speedy deletion. I do a lot of the CSD deletions these days for db-attack, db-spam and db-copyvio, and I turn down a fair number of them and take them to AfD if my guess is that the end result of the discussion is going to be that the article winds up being retained in some form and people are happy about that. I think this is one of those cases ... we'll see. - Dan Dank55 (push to talk) 17:17, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Merge of hard and soft drugs into Drug policy

Join in the fun at Talk:Drug_policy#Merger_proposal - 'hard' and 'soft' are merely two adjectives whose whole being lies within the concept of drug policy, and it should all be on the one page. Casliber (talk · contribs) 01:15, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Request

I'm attempting to massively improve our coverage of various judges, jurists and barristers. So far I've done Lord Mansfield, Lord Denning and Norman Birkett, and I've got an article on Patrick Hastings being worked on in my sandbox. I am, however, only one bloke; could anyone interested in collaborating on such things give me a poke on my talkpage? Ironholds (talk) 05:34, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

Style debate - "Act" or "act"

There is a centralised-ish discussion at Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions#act (statute) on whether we should use "Act of Parliament" or "act of Parliament" - we have historically used the former, but there's a move to systematically use the latter.

This debate went around in a circular shouting match earlier in the month, and it'd be nice to have it settled one way or the other! I figure most of those interested will see this, so if people could leave some opinions either way (or even a "don't care"), it'd be great, and hopefully we can get a clear consensus on it this time so the argument doesn't drag out indefinitely again... Shimgray | talk | 11:42, 31 March 2009 (UTC)