Talk:List of members of the United States House of Representatives who served a single term

Members of category:One term congressmen
Posted here as a result of a question at Categories for discussion/Log/2009 January 3

Enjoy. davidwr/ (talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail)  22:30, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

I have verified all of these appear in the main article, but I'd like someone else to repeat the verification. I found 1 missing and added him already. davidwr/ (talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail)  03:59, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

Delete article
This article may not have been read by anybody since it was written. (See .) That would make it the least read article that I know of in Wikipedia. Even if that were not the case, the main issues are WP:LISTCRUFT:

"The list was created just for the sake of having such a list

The list is of interest to a very limited number of people

The list is a violation of Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information"

I'm recommending the article be deleted. Piano non troppo (talk) 08:35, 17 May 2009 (UTC)


 * We should keep this article. It was created by me and added to by several others because no other such list could be found anywhere else. Wikipedia is not about a popularity contest. Are we now to remove articles because they aren't as popular as Hannah Montana or Pokemon? Come on! All of these people served in congress for only one term and thus are notable for that reason alone. OddibeKerfeld (talk) 19:41, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

Eric Massa
I'm impressed with how fast someone updated this list to add Eric Massa to it. Impressive. MaxMercy (talk) 19:56, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Split?
Hey, thanks for your edits on the one-term congresspeople page! I was thinking of splitting it into multiple pages, with 10 congresses per page, and we use the List of members of the United States House of Representatives who served a single term page as kind of a hub? Similar to List of gay, lesbian or bisexual people, where the "list" page is a hub with links to the actual list, divided alphabetically. Doing this would solve our size issues, and allow us to keep the portraits. Let me know what you think. MAINEiac4434 (talk) 17:47, 30 September 2019 (UTC)


 * I generally think that WP:spliting should only be used in extreme situations. List pages are better as a combined, even-though-long, article because it's easier to compare members of the list and to search on them.  Therefore, if we have to reduce length, then I would suggest removing unnecessary information, such as members' parties and/or the Congress headings themselves because we really only need the member's years and electoral histories. —GoldRingChip 17:54, 30 September 2019 (UTC)


 * I would argue that the parties are crucial to this list. Although I'm not sure if the size issue is a "big" issue so to speak. I suppose we'll know when we're done adding in all the tables. MAINEiac4434 (talk) 05:09, 2 October 2019 (UTC)


 * Indeed, parties are usually good to include. When the tables are finished that will add a lot of new code which should greatly push up the size of this article. —GoldRingChip 14:17, 2 October 2019 (UTC)

Notability
I want to build on, that two-comment section from 11 years ago. This seems like WP:NOTDIR to me, specifically #6, a "non-encyclopedic cross-categorization". There are no sources that indicate that single-term members are unique, and given that swing districts do swing back and forth from cycle to cycle (as we saw in some seats from 2018 to 2020), I doubt that there is much coverage given to it. There are so many single-term members that it does not seem to be a notable cross-categorization. The sentence Many members who serve in the House for only one term are viewed by historians and political experts as accidental members due to having been elected by either riding in on the coattails of a popular presidential or statewide candidate or by winning against a scandalized incumbent. is unsourced and I'm not seeing anything to back it up via WP:BEFORE. I'm initiating this discussion as a precursor to AfD, to see if anyone can sway me otherwise. – Muboshgu (talk) 18:36, 6 December 2020 (UTC)

Different lists for members who served a full single term and those who served less
I am of the view that serving a single full term and serving less than that should be considered distinct classifications with separate lists. For those in favor of deleting this list, the latter category may be more notable to list than the former. List of members of the United States House of Representatives who served less than a full term is an appropriate title for the latter category. Elassint Hi 00:44, 11 January 2021 (UTC)