Template:Did you know nominations/Wilko v. Swan, Rodriguez de Quijas v. Shearson/American Express Inc.

Wilko v. Swan, Rodriguez de Quijas v. Shearson/American Express Inc.

 * ... that the U.S. Supreme Court overruled Wilko v. Swan 36 years later in Rodriguez de Quijas v. Shearson/American Express Inc. because changes in arbitration could better protect investors' rights?
 * Reviewed: Tatra Confederation, Anti-Imperialist Front
 * Comment: As usual with a two-article submission I reviewed two other noms, one of which has been unreviewed for a long time.

Created/expanded by Daniel Case (talk). Self nom at 14:49, 28 April 2012 (UTC)


 * The "it" in the second part of the sentence is ambiguous. The Wilko v. Swan is based almost exclusively on case law, not secondary sources. I'm a little uncomfortable with that.--Carabinieri (talk) 16:41, 10 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Reworded to avoid the issue. As to your second concern ... could you clarify? I understand how you could see court opinions as primary sources, and I don't know how familiar you are with them, but they don't easily fit into our source classifications. They're written in fairly plain language, after all; I don't think you need a secondary source to tell you that when the U.S. Supreme Court writes "We now conclude that Wilko was incorrectly decided, and is inconsistent with the prevailing uniform construction of other federal statutes governing arbitration agreements in the setting of business transactions," it's overruling that decision for the reasons given. Yes, I am aware that some people are afraid of potentially untrained hands interpreting a specialized text for readers; that's why I quote so much from the original opinions. A fair amount of our articles on legal topics quote from statutes and court decisions, after all. Daniel Case (talk) 05:59, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Can someone else look at this? Carabineri has been active in the last five days yet hasn't seen fit to rereview. Daniel Case (talk) 18:52, 16 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Sorry about that. The reason I haven't answered is that I'm uncertain myself. Other reviewers have gotten pretty strict about the use of primary sources. So, it would indeed be good if someone else could take a look at this.--Carabinieri (talk) 16:55, 17 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Symbol confirmed.svg Symbol confirmed.svg Both articles are new enough, long enough, neutrally written, and well cited throughout. The hook is interesting and cited. There are no copyvio issues, and of course the quotations from the various judgements (perhaps I should say "Opinions" when we come to the reports from the U. S. Supreme Court?) are not in copyright. On the question of whether we should object to citations from judgements as being primary sources, a judgement is in some respects a secondary source (when setting out legislation, earlier case law, and facts found on evidence) and in some respects a primary source (when it comes to the reasoning and decisions of justices). In any event, judgements are authoritative and must surely be considered to be reliable sources in a way that primary sources generally cannot. If this were a Good Article review, then we should need to fuss over the matter, but if these articles do not pass muster for DYK then I wonder how many more interesting new articles on legal subjects we shall need to reject. Moonraker (talk) 04:59, 18 May 2012 (UTC)