Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Mississippi's 4th congressional district special election, 1981/archive1


 * The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was archived by Ian Rose via FACBot (talk) 12:14, 7 September 2018.

Mississippi's 4th congressional district special election, 1981

 * Nominator(s):  Nomader  ( talk ) 15:50, 5 August 2018 (UTC)

This is an article about a somewhat bizarre U.S. Congressional special election back in 1981 in Mississippi before the Republican shift had fully finished in the South. It involves a sex scandal, an upset victory, Ronald Reagan, and the Voting Rights Act (the perfect U.S. 1980's election). The format is heavily inspired by both New York's 20th congressional district special election, 2009 and California's 12th congressional district election, 1946, but it's slightly different due to the format of the campaign.

This is my first FAC, and I'm indebted to the incredibly thorough comments from Spirit of Eagle both before this FAC and at GAN. I solicited advice from a couple of FAC mentors but didn't receive anything back, and I've decided to ahead with this nomination. Looking forward to your comments and questions.  Nomader  ( talk ) 15:50, 5 August 2018 (UTC)


 * Hi, I've only read the "Background" section and skimmed some of the rest so far, but will probably review a little more. In that section, the details on Hinson's homosexuality and resignation seem excessive to me and, given the subject matter, maybe even a little voyeuristic. I think the last paragraph in particular is completely irrelevant, but I'd suggest condensing the rest of the section. I was curious how vote-splitting could help Hinson win the election in a run-off system. There are a number of questions I would have expected to see answered in the "Background" that aren't addressed. What was the geographic, social, demographic, and political composition of the district? What was the political climate at the local, state or national level like at the time? What were the hot-button political issues in recent elections?--Carabinieri (talk) 11:03, 25 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Fair points-- thinking about how to redo the formatting here, I'll move the background into different sections with "Districts and campaigns" and then "Hinson resignation", similar to the CA-12 election article. Should be a good place to describe all of those answers which are kind of spread out through the rest of the article otherwise. I'll ping you once the section has been redone.


 * The normal even year mid-term elections are not conducted in a runoff format, only the special election is (making the vote-splitting work). Will make sure that the different special election format is clear here as well in the rewrite of this portion.  Nomader  ( talk ) 23:33, 25 August 2018 (UTC)

Source review - spotchecks not done


 * Associated Press is an agency, not an author, and be consistent in whether you include a leading "The"
 * Be consistent in whether you use or don't use via for Newspapers.com


 * Use pp for sfn refs to multiple pages, and use ndashes for page ranges


 * Be consistent in whether you include the leading "The" in newspaper names


 * Trim GBooks links - in a Sources list you really only need the id


 * Be consistent in whether you include locations in Sources. Nikkimaria (talk) 16:36, 25 August 2018 (UTC)
 * I've fixed all of these problems except for two. Does the style guide really say I should remove the 'The's from newspapers that have them in their official names? The only ones that have them there are "The Washington Post" and "The New York Times" -- the other's official names are the ones listed. With the locations in sources-- what are you referring to there? Otherwise all others fixed.  Nomader  ( talk ) 23:49, 25 August 2018 (UTC)
 * No, the issue is consistency - for example in footnote 17 you have The Clarion-Ledger, but then footnote 20 has simply Clarion-Ledger. Similarly with the books, the Barone source has a location but the Nash source does not - it doesn't matter whether you choose to include the location or not, but whichever choice you make should be consistently applied. Nikkimaria (talk) 00:48, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Understood, that makes complete sense-- thanks. I made those edits per your comment here.  Nomader  ( talk ) 05:02, 26 August 2018 (UTC)

Coord note
Sorry but this nom has been a bit of a non-starter, attracting little commentary after several weeks, so I'm going to achieve it. I realise it must be a bit disheartening soliciting reviews and getting few if any takers, but you are eligible to try the FAC mentoring scheme, which might help kick-start things. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 12:13, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

Ian Rose (talk) 12:14, 7 September 2018 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.