Talk:Lewis Strauss

Oppenheimer Security Hearing
Hello I have created a new sub-section for this topic and expanded the content, largely based on the WP article on the Oppenheimer security hearing. The security hearing was a major turning point in Strauss's career and deserves a fuller, and more balanced, treament than in the previous version. Happy to discuss. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 04:43, 17 August 2023 (UTC)


 * It's reasonable to expand the hearings material and to make it its own section. However what's here needs to stress what Strauss did rather than recap what happened in the hearing, which has its own article that can be mentioned in the xref at the beginning of the section.  In particular, there is no need to get into the Chevalier interactions here.  So I have revised the material in this section along these lines.  Wasted Time R (talk) 15:22, 26 August 2023 (UTC)
 * The problem is that your rewrite presents the opinions of selected writers as facts. This is contrary to policy on NPOV. Specifically, policy states: "Avoid stating opinions as facts. Usually, articles will contain information about the significant opinions that have been expressed about their subjects. However, these opinions should not be stated in Wikipedia's voice." Also: "Avoid stating seriously contested assertions as facts. If different reliable sources make conflicting assertions about a matter, treat these assertions as opinions rather than facts, and do not present them as direct statements." And: "Prefer nonjudgmental language. A neutral point of view neither sympathizes with nor disparages its subject"
 * For example your version states: "Strauss initially hoped that Oppenheimer would quietly resign, but when Oppenheimer chose to contest the charges, Strauss became determined to prevail, and to do it before Oppenheimer's security clearance was due to expire anyway." This is an interpretation of Strauss' behaviour and it therefore a matter of opinion. The people who wrote it can't read minds. I certainly agree that it is a plausible explanation (probably the most plausible), but it should be written as an opinion attributed to particular authors. It probably belongs in the Legacy section where the pros and cons can be discussed. In a brief factual section on the Security hearing it's best to stick to the known facts.
 * "Strauss used his position as head of the AEC to render corrupt aspects of the AEC's procedural and legal systems." Once again, just the opinion of particular authors. It's better to just describe the aspects which were unfair to Oppenheimer. I've added a sentence from the later review which found that the hearings violated the AEC's own rules for procedural fairness. This is objective information.
 * "There was enough behavior in Oppenheimer's past to make some of the charges against him possibly believable, and Oppenheimer sometimes struggled in his own testimony." Once again just the opinion of a couple of authors. It's best to briefly present the key evidence which damaged Oppenheimer.
 * "In the end, despite the support of numerous leading scientists and other prominent figures, Oppenheimer was stripped of his clearance, one day before it would have expired anyway, as Strauss had wanted." If you are going to say that numerous scientists and other prominent figures supported Oppenheimer, you need to say who didn't support him and why the panel found that he was a security risk.
 * The bit in the end about how Oppenheimer was a broken man is obviously meant to pull the heart strings and violates policy: "A neutral point of view neither sympathizes with nor disparages its subject." It's best to briefly state the immediate consequences for both Oppenheimer and Strauss.
 * I understand that there is room for disagreement on what is relevant to add or remove and am happy to discuss this. My aim is to present the relevant information about the hearings from a more NPOV. There's room to thrash out the hero vs villain stuff in the legacy section. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 00:27, 27 August 2023 (UTC)

Neutral Point of View
Hello all,

I have made some changes to the wording in the "Legacy" and "Strauss and Oppenheimer" sections as the previous wording included a few editorial comments which were not in the sources cited, or expressed opinions about Strauss as if they were fact. I have attributed the relevant statements to their authors. I have tried to reword things with a NPOV which, "neither sympathizes with nor disparages its subject." See: NPOV

Happy to discuss Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 08:09, 27 August 2023 (UTC)


 * Regarding what you say in this section and the one above it, when it comes to WP:WIKIVOICE there is a range of practice among experienced editors when it comes to what constitutes guidelines such as "Avoid stating seriously contested assertions as facts". If just about every quality history/biography states that person A did something for a given reason, even if that reason is not a "fact" but something the writers have inferred from their study of events and evidence and personalities, many editors will put it in wikivoice.  But others will prefer to attribute it in-text to those writers, and still others will prefer to leave it out entirely.  I tend towards the wikivoice side of things and you clearly do not.  But at least one advantage of your approach is that it will leave readers puzzled as to why certain things happened and they will go off and read some of the books used as references, and that is all to the good.  Wasted Time R (talk) 15:51, 3 September 2023 (UTC)
 * You can select facts in a way that leads readers to a certain conclusion, even if you don't intend to do so, and stating these facts in the WP voice compounds the problems. For example, those trying to push a sympathetic view of Oppenheimer often point out that the revocation of his security clearance was finalised the day before it was due to expire "anyway". That would leave readers puzzled until they read less biased books and understand that Stauss was acting on the president's executive order that a wall be put between Oppenheimer and nuclear secrets; that Oppenheimer's security clearance was suspended on December 10; that it was Oppenheimer who insisted on a hearing (as was his right); and that a hearing would obviously take time. The article already makes it clear that Strauss was vindictive, but the fact that the whole process took seven months to complete wasn't entirely his fault. Perhaps the article should state that Strauss also wanted Oppenheimer fired from the Institute of Advanced Study but didn't have the numbers to push it through. That tells more about Strauss than the fortuitous timing of the final revocation of Opp's clearance. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 00:59, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

Length and inappropriate editorial detail
Just referring to this article to get a general idea of Strauss’s biography, this article strikes me as both painfully long and peppered with inferences and statements regarding Strauss’s personal beliefs and motivations that aren’t particularly relevant or useful. 150 some odd citations seems quite a bit for marginal historical figure.

A lengthy seeming discussion of his relationship with Oppenheimer that delves into comparing and contrasting their feelings about their Jewish identity is excessive, for example.

im not going to make any edits, but I do think someone could exercise some restraint in the editing 86.49.248.141 (talk) 21:09, 20 September 2023 (UTC)


 * Excuse me, 275 citations (!). I understand he was an important guy, but this article rivals that of presidents legendary historical figures. 86.49.248.141 (talk) 21:13, 20 September 2023 (UTC)


 * You are entitled to your view that Strauss is a "marginal historical figure", but others would disagree. As you can see from the Bibliography section, there has been one full-length biography and several journal articles written about him and he appears as a major figure in a number of other books about the early Cold War period.  The number of citations is largely due to the article having been put up and getting approved for Good Article status (the green mark on the upper right), which generally requires sentence-by-sentence citing.


 * The article is 9,500 words long, which is within the general Wikipedia guidelines for article length. As to whether it's too many words for this particular subject compared to other subjects, that's generally a losing game to play in Wikipedia.  Symphony No. 6 (Beethoven), the Pastoral, gets only 850 words, while "Hotter than Hell (Dua Lipa song)", a modest pop hit at best, gets 2,250 words.  Is that reasonable?  Of course not.  The explanation?  Some editor was interested in the Dua Lipa song and drove it to GA status, while no editors have ever done the same for the Pastoral.  Is that fair?  Of course not.  But that's how it works here.  Finally, if all you want is "to get a general idea of Strauss's biography", all you need to read is the lead section at the top, which is a self-contained summary of the rest of the article and is only 400 words.


 * As for the relationship with Oppenheimer, that may be the section that readers are most interested in. But that's the point: no one need read the whole article.  The idea is that you read the lead, and then you can expand out any of the detail sections as you wish.    Wasted Time R (talk) 23:43, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

Info from someone researching Strauss
https://twitter.com/ddiamond/status/1769422631801905503 VickiMeagher (talk) 18:02, 17 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Thanks for posting this. As the tweet indicates, this article was indeed incorrect.  The American Presidency Project document already being used as a source indicates that "Mr. Strauss served under a recess appointment as Secretary of Commerce from November 13, 1958, through June 30, 1959. His letter of resignation, dated June 23, was released with the President's reply."  I have corrected the article to indicate June 30 as his final day as secretary.  Wasted Time R (talk) 10:31, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

Misleading
The paragraph copied below reads misleading to me. I've read the Bernstein article and the one Bernstein quoted and it's not really clear to me what "recent" means here. Bernstein's whole argument is that Oppenheimer was a CP member. His article and the 2012 one he cited take that position, and they both take a lot of time arguing against the Bird/Sherwin take. I don't really see "recent" evidence that hasn't already been hotly debated. The matter of whether O was a CP member is obviously a debated issue, and I don't think the below paragraph takes this reality into account; therefore, I think it misleading and think it should be revised unless someone who understands why it was drafted this way disagrees.

"In 2023, Bernstein stated that recent evidence that Oppenheimer had been a secret member of the Communist Party partially vindicated Strauss. "Strauss was devious, thin-skinned, mean-spirited, and even vicious in helping to do in Robert Oppenheimer. But on some important matters—in even somewhat suspecting Oppenheimer’s political past—Strauss was not unreasonable."" Mmash16 (talk) 02:15, 16 May 2024 (UTC)


 * It doesn't seem misleading to me. Bernstein's footnotes make it clear that when he is referring to recent evidence he means the Vassiliev notebooks, Barbara Chevalier's unpublished notes and Griffith's unpublished memoir. But the point isn't whether these sources have been hotly debated. The point is that it is significant that a notable critic of Strauss believes that this evidence indicates that Strauss's suspicion that Oppenheimer had been a secret communist was not unreasonable. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 08:33, 31 May 2024 (UTC)