Template talk:Infobox legislation/2010-2013

"Repeals" parameter
[Copied from User talk:Jacklee.] I think we should add a "repeals" parameter to the infobox, to indicate section(s) of any statute(s) that have been repealed. NorthernThunder (talk) 22:46, 7 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Sure, ✅. Thanks for the suggestion! — Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 04:14, 8 March 2010 (UTC)

Unpassed bills
Is there an infobox for notable bills that were not passed? If not, can we add a  parameter to this infobox that would put a big notice near the top to say that it never became law? —Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 17:18, 12 December 2012 (UTC)
 * There used to be Infobox Bill, but that was deemed redundant to this template and now redirects here. Your suggestion is good – let me look into it. Would it suffice if there was a field stating "Status" with values like "Pending as of [date]" and "Not enacted"? — Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 03:55, 13 December 2012 (UTC)
 * If we can make the parameter multi-purpose, that would be good. My main interest is to make it look significantly different for unpassed bills, either putting that information right at the top or using a different colour. —Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 07:32, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
 * What do you think about a "Status" parameter appearing after "Territorial extent"? Obviously, the parameters below it ("Enacted by", "Date enacted", and so on) would not be used. I think it might be necessary to have another parameter to take the place of enactedby to indicate the legislative body that is considering or considered the bill, because "Enacted by" is inappropriate for a bill that is not yet or has not been enacted. I'm rather busy this week, but I'll try and do an updated version of the infobox in a sandbox by the end of next week. You can then let me have your comments on it. — Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 10:53, 14 December 2012 (UTC)

OK, I added two new parameters, status and consideredby, to the sandboxed version of the template, and you can view that version in action on the testcases page. Let me know if this is what you have in mind. — Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 17:23, 16 December 2012 (UTC)
 * The consideredby one was a good idea. For the status, I just noticed that Template:Infobox settlement/testcases has something close to what I was thinking. Notice the blue bar at the top of the infobox that says whether the settlement is a city or a town or whatnot. I think that the legislation's status should be as prominent as that blue bar because there is a huge difference between a failed bill and an in-force act (or a regulation, a bylaw, etc). —Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 06:58, 17 December 2012 (UTC)
 * OK, I created a status bar but had to put it at the bottom of the infobox. It displays a different colour depending on whether the value of status is "Not passed" (pink), "Pending" (amber), "In force" (green) or "Repealed" (grey). Let me know what you think of the colour choices. Again, have a look at the testcases page. — Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 18:35, 17 December 2012 (UTC)
 * the sandbox and template changed quite a bit from the time this discussion concluded. I attempted to re-introduce the proposed changes in [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Template:Infobox_legislation/sandbox&oldid=533861444 this version], which looks fine to me.  I would support a change that (or a similar variant). Frietjes (talk) 16:16, 19 January 2013 (UTC)
 * OK, that looks fine. Thanks! — Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 16:33, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

Parameters for laws passed by bicameral legislatures?
I was thinking somewhere along the lines of,   and related tags (similar to that of Infobox U.S. legislation) which would be useful for laws passed by other countries with bicameral legislatures. Currently, the template's Legislation History section only supports details of a law that were passed by a unicameral body. Xeltran (talk) 11:34, 5 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I think that's a very good suggestion. There's currently an updated version of the template being worked on in the sandbox; I'll add the proposed parameters to it. — Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 12:33, 5 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks! Looking forward to it! Xeltran (talk) 13:36, 5 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I've added some additional parameters to "Template:Infobox legislation/sandbox", but haven't tested them out. Could you provide an example of a jurisdiction with a bicameral legislature that you'd like to use the infobox for? Also, what additional information are you likely to want to include in the infobox? I've added the parameters enacted_by2, date_enacted2 and date_passed2. Is that enough? — Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 18:52, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Follow-up: I've tried using this on Responsible Parenthood and Reproductive Health Act of 2012 and there's an issue on  and   when using it on laws/bills made by bicameral legislatures. Perhaps renaming the  and   parameters into some other names will help, introducing   which defaults into   when there are no parameters for a second chamber.

Also, there has to be new parameters when some bills are resolved by conference committees on bicameral legislatures. This includes the date the bill was passed by the committee, and the dates when the bill approved by the committee was passed by both chambers. – H T  D  12:18, 1 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the feedback. I made some tweaks to the template at "Responsible Parenthood and Reproductive Health Act of 2012"; let me know if this is what you were trying to achieve. If a statute has been enacted by a bicameral legislature, you should use enacted_by for the chamber that first introduced the bill, and enacted_by2 for the chamber that considered the bill next. Thus, if the bill in question was first introduced in the House of Representatives of the Philippines and then considered by the Senate of the Philippines, you should use " " and " ". If you also wish to indicate the name of the legislature, use legislature like this: " ".


 * Could you please explain in a bit more detail how the conference committee process works? What information would be needed in the template? — Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 18:19, 1 March 2013 (UTC)


 * There's an issue to what you've did:
 * It is wrong to say it enacted solely by the House or of the Senate, it was enacted by Congress, which is the House and the Senate. It has to be enacted be passed on third reading by both Houses. If the bill of the last chamber that enacted it doesn't have an identical version with the counterpart bill of the other chamber, either they'd form a conference committee to thresh out the differences, or either chamber will give in to the version of the other chamber.
 * (In this case, you'd probably think of as  and   as the third reading in both chambers, unless there's a conference committee.)
 * As for conference committee, it's like this:
 * Bill introduced in one (doesn't matter which, but some bills start at the House) chamber, gets passed.
 * Counterpart bill introduced in the other chamber, gets passed. However, the bills are not identical.
 * Conference committee is formed to thresh out the differences. The new bill is then passed to both chambers.
 * New bill is passed by one chamber. (At this point neither chamber can introduce amendments any more; either yes or no or abstain.)
 * New bill is passed by the other chamber, is enacted.
 * Bill is signed by the president.
 * Therefore, in bicameral legislatures where consent of both chambers is needed, the infobox format should be:
 * Legislative history
 * (this is the date of enactment for bills that don't need to go through the conference committee)
 * A new parameter on the date the conference committee passed the bill
 * A new parameter on the date the chamber A passed the conference committee's version of the bill
 * A new parameter on the date the chamber B passed the conference committee's version of the bill (this is the date of enactment for reconciled bills)
 * – H T  D  20:02, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
 * (this is the date of enactment for bills that don't need to go through the conference committee)
 * A new parameter on the date the conference committee passed the bill
 * A new parameter on the date the chamber A passed the conference committee's version of the bill
 * A new parameter on the date the chamber B passed the conference committee's version of the bill (this is the date of enactment for reconciled bills)
 * – H T  D  20:02, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
 * (this is the date of enactment for bills that don't need to go through the conference committee)
 * A new parameter on the date the conference committee passed the bill
 * A new parameter on the date the chamber A passed the conference committee's version of the bill
 * A new parameter on the date the chamber B passed the conference committee's version of the bill (this is the date of enactment for reconciled bills)
 * – H T  D  20:02, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
 * A new parameter on the date the chamber A passed the conference committee's version of the bill
 * A new parameter on the date the chamber B passed the conference committee's version of the bill (this is the date of enactment for reconciled bills)
 * – H T  D  20:02, 1 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Those suggestions assume that all bicameral legislature use a conference committee to reconcile bills, which is not necessarily the case. Mr Serjeant Buzfuz (talk) 00:11, 3 March 2013 (UTC)
 * I was asked how it worked, and I explained it. The assumptions are moot as these would be optional to those that use this procedure. – H T  D  15:23, 3 March 2013 (UTC)
 * It might be "wrong" in the Philippines to say that a particular piece of legislation is passed by only one legislative chamber, but it isn't necessarily wrong in other jurisdictions. In those jurisdictions, editors may use enacted_by and enacted_by2 to give the names of the legislative chambers that enacted the legislation, and if they want to state the name of the legislature as a whole they can use legislature. Happily, all these parameters are optional, so if you wish to use enacted_by for the name of the legislature as a whole (as you did in your comment above) you can do so. I've no objection to adding parameters relating to conference committees. The parameters will be optional, so they can simply be omitted for jurisdictions that don't have conference committees. — Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 17:54, 3 March 2013 (UTC)
 * I've added the parameters conf_committee_passed, conf_committee_passed2 and date_conf_committee. See the template documentation for further information. — Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 18:32, 3 March 2013 (UTC)
 * (E/C) The issue here is that "Enacted by" immediately below "Date passed" defaults into whatever name of the chamber is first mentioned in legislative history, when it should be say refer to name of the bicameral legislature. See this example:


 * Otherwise the current setup is fine; this is actually more superior than the infobox US laws are using.. I haven't checked, but this is remedied by changing  into   (or any other parameter name) so that for cases such as this, the name+link of the legislature appears instead of the first chamber mentioned in the legislative history section. Another option is put a sub-parameter on all unicameral parameters, which automatically defaults into a unicameral parameter, then use the sub-parameter for bicameral legislatures. For example,   becomes  . – H  T  D  19:06, 3 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Also, a second "Enacted by" appears to it has to be suppressed somehow as a bill can only be enacted once.
 * AFAIK, this system is true in the US Congress, and probably most legislatures that were modeled from the US Congress, where the consent of both houses is needed for most bills; and a weaker house can't just merely delay it. AFAIK this setup does not happen only on a few legislatures. – H T  D  18:52, 3 March 2013 (UTC)
 * BTW, what's the difference between "Date enacted" and "Date passed"? is this an WP:ENGVAR thing? !– H T  D 

Ah, yes, I forgot that the template also uses enacted_by in conjunction with bill. However, I don't really understand your suggested remedy, so you'll need to explain it to me in another way. By the way, please experiment with the template at "Template:Infobox legislation/sandbox" and test it out at "Template:Infobox legislation/testcases", ensuring that any changes do not create errors before copying them to Infobox legislation. Do discuss drastic changes on this talk page before making them live.

To me, "date enacted" and "date passed" mean the same thing. I think the option is provided so that editors can use the terminology that is most appropriate to the jurisdictions they are working on. It could have been inserted after other infoboxes were merged into this one. — Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 19:20, 3 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Apparently, my first solution failed, so I guess this one should work. Basically, all of the parameters for unicameral legislatures that defaults into the 1st chamber that's shown for bicameral parliaments will be tweaked. They'd be like this:
 * Also, the second "Enacted by" shouldn't appear. – H T  D  19:31, 3 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Also, the second "Enacted by" shouldn't appear. – H T  D  19:31, 3 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Also, the second "Enacted by" shouldn't appear. – H T  D  19:31, 3 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Also, the second "Enacted by" shouldn't appear. – H T  D  19:31, 3 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Also, the second "Enacted by" shouldn't appear. – H T  D  19:31, 3 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Also, the second "Enacted by" shouldn't appear. – H T  D  19:31, 3 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Also, the second "Enacted by" shouldn't appear. – H T  D  19:31, 3 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Also, the second "Enacted by" shouldn't appear. – H T  D  19:31, 3 March 2013 (UTC)

Images
Any reason why historical legislatures can't be added at the Images subpage? I dunno if any of the law passed by the Philippine Legislature are still in force, but the National Assembly of the Philippines and the Batasang Pambansa still had some laws in force. And how about presidential decrees, i.e. laws made by the president? I considered adding. – H T  D  11:20, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Sorry, my mistake. I thought these were the names of the buildings rather than past legislatures. I will revert my change. Yes, you can add "President of the Philippines" if you wish. Please update the documentation subpage "Template:Infobox legislation/images/doc" as well. As for the coat of arms of the Philippines, if this is used by the Congress of the Philippines then it is fine to use it in the template. However, I noticed that at "Congress of the Philippines" the crests of the Senate and the House of Representatives were used rather than the coat of arms of the Philippines. — Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 12:29, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
 * That's because someone was insisting on using a nonexistent logo for Congress as a single body. So I thought of something to help prevent the addition of that. The coats of arms are being used as images on other legislatures too, as seen on the doc page. – H T  D  13:13, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
 * That's because those legislatures officially use the country's crest or coat of arms. But if this isn't the case for the Philippines, then we shouldn't do so. I actually made a request at "commons:Commons:Graphics Lab/Illustration workshop" for a single image combining the crests of the Senate and House of Representatives to be created specifically for use in this template. Shall we use that instead, once it has been created? — Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 14:59, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
 * While legislatures pass bills, ultimately it is the head of state that signs the bill into law, thereby it's the most important "vote" (vetoes aside). This means the lawmaking process isn't exclusively the work of legislature, and while the Philippine Congress doesn't have a logo of its own, it's perfectly valid to use the national (or state) coat of arms when presenting bills or laws. See for example the UK Parliament example: the image used is for the national coat of arms, but the Parliament "unofficial" logo is the black Crowned Portcullis, with Commons using the green and the Lords using the red version. (Also, the queen is seen as the "third" component of parliament.) – H T  D  15:15, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
 * OK, in that case I will withdraw my request at the Graphics Lab. — Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 19:54, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
 * It's also a better idea to leave the image blank in this case. – H T  D  02:57, 5 March 2013 (UTC)

"Repeals" parameter/section
The use of the  section is somewhat unclear in both the documentation and the result it produces in the template. Currently the documentation says "The citations of any notable legislation repealing parts or previous versions of the legislation." (My emphasis.) I don't understand the point of the "or previous versions". Also, in the template it produces a header labeled "Repeals": to me that is ambiguous as to whether it refers to acts repealed by the law in question, or acts repealing the law in question. Would anyone object if I changed the documentation to say "The citations of any notable legislation repealing the legislation or parts of the legislation." and the header in the template from "Repeals" to "Repealing legislation" (which is the term used by Infobox UK legislation)? - htonl (talk) 10:45, 18 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Can't remember if I wrote the documentation for that parameter, but on a plain reading of the reference to "previous versions" I guess it means that one can use the parameter to indicate legislation that repeals previous versions of the legislation that is the subject of the article. However, I have no objection if you want to narrow the scope of the parameter by rephrasing the documentation as suggested. Also, don't forget to document the recent change you made to the template – the addition of the new status. Thanks. — Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 18:28, 18 March 2013 (UTC)