Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2017 February 1

= February 1 =

Executive orders?
Just what sort of outrageous edicts can Trump enact with executive orders? Can Congress trammel his activities in any way? (please?)--31.92.250.145 (talk) 00:45, 1 February 2017 (UTC)


 * He can issue any edict he chooses. They're all capable of being subjected to judicial review per Marbury v. Madison (see this article for more) ... in essence Executive Orders cannot make new law nor break existing law. Congress is, I think, limited to such things as impeachment, the 25th amendment and the initiation of judicial reviews. The current problem may well become: what happens when TheDonald chooses to ignore the outcomes of judicial reviews. --Tagishsimon (talk) 00:57, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * He apparently already is: Executive_Order_13769. What happens next will probably set the tone for the next four years. Someguy1221 (talk) 01:06, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * And he fired the acting AG, who expressed doubts about the legality of the order, and replaced her with a yes-man. We can expect a lot of that kind of thing as well. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 03:46, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * The issue with the U.S. government, what with its three branches of government and its separation of powers and all that is the tacit agreement, over time, that each of the three branches would eventually respect the limitations put on it by the other two. In every case I can think of from history, no branch of the three in U.S. history has ever just said "Fuck you" to the other two branches and unilaterally acted on its own.  In cases where a branch did exceed its traditional authority, it did so in ways where the other to were complicit or agreed to allow it (such as when the Lincoln or FDR administrations, by executive order, overrode constitutional principles, but where Congress and the Courts let them, i.e. Executive Order 9066 and Executive Order 9102 which directly violated the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution which states plainly that "No person shall...be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law").  In all of those cases, there was no court that said they had to stop; whether courts should or should not have stopped them is a different matter, but there was never a constitutional crisis precipitated by these overreaches, because the other branches authorized them, or at least didn't object.  At no point that I can remember, find, or cite did the executive branch make policy, then the courts struck down as illegal or unconstitutional, and which the executive than simply ignored the courts and kept doing what it was doing.  This is uncharted territory in American history.  -- Jayron 32 03:58, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Ahem... Marshall has made his decision, now let him enforce it. Someguy1221 (talk) 04:16, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Ahem ahem "Andrew Jackson's famous, though apocryphal, quote "John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it!" In reality, this quote did not appear until 30 years after the incident and was first printed in a textbook authored by Jackson critic Horace Greeley.[18]" (bold mine). Try again.  Furthermore, the court in Worcester v. Georgia merely ruled that the State of Georgia itself could not remove said Indians since Indian Affairs was the sole purview of the Federal Government.  The Indian Removal Act of 1830 had already authorized the Feds to do what the State of Georgia was already trying to do, and the Jackson and Van Buren administrations had both the authorization of Congress and no objection from the Courts to the removal of the Indians from the Southeast.  Worcester v. Georgia was an interesting side note, but ultimately meant nothing for our discussion.  It was a narrow ruling on the federalism in the U.S. vis a vis the power of states vs. the Federal government, and placed no actual restrictions on Jackson's administration.   Marshall and Jackson certainly hated each other, but ultimately Jackson never enacted any policy under his power over the explicit denial of such power by the courts. -- Jayron 32 04:25, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Why did I trust my high school history textbook? Someguy1221 (talk) 04:33, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * It must not have been a reliable source. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 05:17, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * That's a question every citizen of every country should ask (exasperatedly) of themselves. Our view of history in schools is colored by those who get to decide what is taught, and it is better to seek scholarship on our own than to merely accept what is told to us by one single source.  -- Jayron 32 14:28, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * The official language of the US will be Swedish, underwear will be changed every half hour, and worn on the outside for inspection. More srsly I was hoping someone could explain the Sally Yates thing.  As I understand it, the EO was challenged in court (by the ACLU?) and a federal judge issued a stay on enforcement while the lawsuit inches through the system.  I've seen: 1) "Yates refused to defend the EO" which sounds like she refused to go to court to argue in its favor: but can that be right?  I thought that would be the Solicitor General's job, not the AG's.  I've also seen 2) she told the Justice Dept (US Attorneys I guess) to not enforce the order.  That that a) would seem to do nothing about the DHS and other agencies doing the actual enforcement but who aren't under her jurisdiction(?); b) she would have been telling her attorneys to follow the court order.  That seemed logical to me since I thought people who ignore federal court orders get thrown in jail ("they can lock you in a room and throw away the room!").  I'm not trying to advocate any viewpoint here, just confused about the specifics, which the articles I looked at seemed to ignore, concentrating on the more theatrical aspects instead.  Not seeking legal advice either, obviously; just following events slightly.. 50.0.136.56 (talk) 08:06, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * The Solicitor General of the United States is responsible for representing the United States before the US Supreme Court, and reports to the Attorney General of the United States though is nominally co-equal. In all other court actions, the US is represented by the AG or one of the attorneys that works under the AG (often several steps removed).  Yes, Yates refused to the defend the EO, and ordered all the attorneys under her not to defend it in court either.  If allowed to stand, this would usually have the effect of allowing the opposing party (e.g. the ACLU) to prevail.  At present, the Federal Courts have only issued temporary restraining orders with respect to a few hundred individuals caught in transit, etc.  The ACLU and others would prefer to permanently block the entire order, so for example, the US would resume allowing citizens of those prohibited countries to come here and resume issuing visas, etc.  In principle, the AG (and everyone else in government) has a duty to uphold the constitution.  If someone believes they have been given an illegal / unconstitutional order, the appropriate thing to do is to refuse to follow it, though in most cases that will lead to summary dismissal, as it did with Yates.  With most contested Federal actions there is some uncertainty about who is right and wrong, and isn't unusual for an AG to argue on behalf of the US even if they think they are unlikely to prevail.  It is however very unusual for an AG to refuse to defend an action taken by the executive.  Dragons flight (talk) 08:49, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * I see. I had thought the AG's department did stuff like criminal prosecutions, and the SG did other types of government litigation, but I guess I had that wrong.  The SG is supreme court only?  Ok, I should read up on that, thanks (I thought the SG had a lot of deputies and underlings like the AG, to deal with lower court processes). Meanwhile though, how is it that DHS is still doing these detainments when a court has supposedly stayed the practice?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.0.136.56 (talk) 09:08, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * It should be noted that Yates's situation was untenable, as she was placed in a Catch-22. As an agent of the courts (which, as a prosecutor, she and her staff would be) she is bound to uphold the laws of the U.S. without prejudice or regard for personalities involved.  If she had an earnest legal opinion that the EO was unconstitutional, she is bound to uphold the law over the order of her superiors.  However, she is also basically an employee of the executive branch, and as such, Trump is effectively her boss.  He has power to hire and fire her, as established by Myers v. United States.  There have been several commentators who have noted the similarities between the current events and the Saturday Night Massacre during 1973.  -- Jayron 32 14:35, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Maybe. But the Popehat post (and the post confirms the person isn't supportive of Trump) linked below questions some aspects of Yates's handling and response of the situation especially whether was clear enough about it being unconstitutional or at least unlawful. And if she wasn't (and it's perhaps not unreasonable she would need time to consider), the lack of any clarity over how she planned to handle this. And the generally accepted key alternative suggestion not just from Popehat was for her to resign (although not everyone agrees that what she did was particularly different since she clearly didn't ever claim she couldn't just be fired). And people in no-win situations are often going to have their specific response questioned, e.g. James Comey. Notably it's doubtful her clearly outlining the problems with the law publicly would have been better received by Trump or his team (although it could still have been a better choice). And the reason why she was apparently forced into that was because she didn't get the opportunity to do so before the Executive Order came out meaning the whole thing was already public. I'm reminded a bit of another case where an Attorney General apparently refused something the executive wanted  although in that case it was AFAIK mostly kept private at the time, actually intentionally so. Nil Einne (talk) 15:24, 1 February 2017 (UTC)


 * According the press conference on Tuesday, everyone who was detained over the weekend as a result of the EO had either been released into the US or returned to their country of origin. There are some people who dispute whether that is really true, and suggest that DHS may be using a version of the word "detained" that is more limited than what a normal English speaker might expect.  But for the moment, let's say it is true and all the detainees were processed out.  Then the immediate issue of people in DHS custody could have been resolved, but the US is still refusing to allow citizens of the affected countries to fly into the US which continues to create an ongoing concern.  (Under agreements with airlines, people from the affected countries should not be allowed to board planes, and thus will never arrive in the US or enter DHS custody.)  Dragons flight (talk) 09:27, 1 February 2017 (UTC)


 * PS. As far as I know, the temporary injunctions issued so far only applied to people caught up in this mess who had already reached the US. Individuals who are still outside the US will have to wait for further court action if they hope to enter before the bans expire.  Dragons flight (talk) 09:33, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Oh ok, that part was unclear. I thought the court had ordered that people with valid visas could enter, so maybe that's where my misunderstanding was.  Thanks.  I'll try to read some more tomorrow but it's late here now. 50.0.136.56 (talk) 09:37, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Most reports suggested the injuctions applied to both those already in the US as well as those in transit . I don't know how wide the definition of 'in transit' is but I suspect by now it's likely everyone has either arrived in the US or been stopped from arriving, but I can't say for sure. In support of your point, a key point of such agreements is that they generally require airlines to pay for returning the passenger and also a fine, see e.g. this discussion . Airlines may attempted to recover this from the passenger, but it's still in their interest to avoid allowing someone to travel if they'll be refused entry. Therefore it's not just DHS who may be confused about any uncertainty over who they can allow in, but the airline. And they'll generally be unwilling to let someone board if there is uncertainty, with often limited recourse for the passenger. So even if there is a chance you'll have a good case to make with DHS or the US courts, you'll have to find some way to make it from outside the US. Nil Einne (talk) 13:26, 1 February 2017 (UTC)


 * The above is somewhat confused. Executive orders are instructions issued by the President that have the force of law provided they relate to issues where the President has authority granted by either the constitution directly or delegated to him by the laws passed by Congress.  For example, Congress often passes laws that say things like: "In order to properly regulate the sale of wheat and protect human health, the Department of Agriculture shall set and enforce standards on the allowable concentration of insect parts in wheat for human consumption."  The President then has discretion regarding how to set and enforce those standards.  So, he can issue orders governing insect parts in wheat.  (And then the Dept. of Ag. issues various regulations on the issues, etc., etc.)  What an executive order isn't supposed to do is directly contradict Congress, or assert authority over areas of governance which are the domain of Congress and where authority has not been delegated.  However, there is a long history of Presidents trying to stretch the envelope and argue for expansive authority to enact programs they desire by fiat.  Such issues often end up before the Courts.  As should be clear from the above, for many issues Congress has the power to enact laws that cancel out executive orders (except as relates to specific constitutional powers of the President).  Assuming that the program of checks and balances in the US is robust, Congress and the Courts are thus able to limit the power of the President to govern by fiat.  However, this will require the President to respect the actions of Congress and the Courts.  If he refused to, then we would arrive at a constitutional crisis (or worse).  Dragons flight (talk) 09:06, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Right, but this did go to court, and the court issued a stay! So why isn't the stay being followed?  There's a part that I'm missing but I thought that court orders of that type couldn't be ignored without facing big sanctions (like jail).  Meanwhile I see there's a Popehat article up now, that's critical of Yates.  As you say, this is confused; there are multiple moving parts and I haven't seen them all written down in one place yet.  Anyway thanks for these explanations, which are helpful.  50.0.136.56 (talk) 09:14, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Do you have some evidence that the stay isn't being followed? As Dragons flight said, DHS claim that everyone detained is either released or returned. And as I mentioned, it's not clear that there's still anyone in transit. So it's possible anyone affected by the stay has already been dealt with. As Df also mentioned, there is some suggestion that there are still people basically detained, but again I'm not aware of any clear cut evidence that there are still people basically detained. One issue is that some of these people may have limited contact and DHS has been reluctant to release details. Likewise I've seen suggestion that some people were coerced into returning or giving up their visas or whatever, and although it's possible some of these happened after the stay, there isn't clear cut evidence of something clearly in violation of the stay that I'm aware of, just a lot of uncertainty, claims and counter-claims and rumours. Edit: I missed you response above. It sounds then that you now understand it's not clear the stay was violated Nil Einne (talk) 13:36, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Apparently the issue is disputed. 50.0.136.56 (talk) 07:04, 2 February 2017 (UTC)

It's as if some people woke up when a Republican is in office and suddenly discovered Executive Orders. Where were you guys for the past eight years? Sir Joseph (talk) 15:35, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Well, President Hope used them less than The Shrub, who used them less than The Man With the Cigar, who used them less than Bush the Elder (at least if normalised for time in office), who used them less than The Actor, who used them less than The Peanut Guy (again, if normalised for time in office). It's all been going downhill. And the really big users are Wilson and FDR, probably because they had World Wars on their hand. But Trump writes executive orders recklessly, without any form of impact analysis and any significant input from the departments. It's not that he uses them, it's how he uses them - like a 5 year old with a flamethrower. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 18:18, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * There was a difference in what types of EO's Presidents wrote. Obama's orders far stretched the limits of executive authority, so much so that warnings were issued that he was setting a dangerous precedent. Most other orders were in general proclaiming today National Kiss a Wikipedian Day. Sir Joseph (talk) 18:24, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Well, they are all here. I took a look at 2016 and 2017 for Obama, and 2008 and 2009 for Bush, and they don't look that different to me. Many are routine (although no "Kiss a Wikipedian" declarations, sadly), and some are more interesting, but I didn't see anything that massively stood out for either. I think "that warnings were issued" is a quite weak statement - it does matter a bit who issues them... ;-) --Stephan Schulz (talk) 18:35, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * This piece highlights some of the executive overreach, some of which made it to the Supreme Court, http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/the-administration/311608-obamas-curtain-call-a-look-back-on-a-legacy-of and here's the NYTIMES, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/14/us/politics/obama-era-legacy-regulation.html?_r=0 Sir Joseph (talk) 18:44, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Had Congress done its job, there wouldn't have been the need.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Baseball Bugs (talk • contribs) 19:10, 1 February 2017 (UTC)

I shed tears for American democracy, but not for Sally Yates herself. I suspect her future career options are bright, she'll easily get picked up by some high-end law firm, where she'll likely earn as much or more than she did as Attorney-general. I don't want to see her become a paid lobbyist, though. Eliyohub (talk) 18:10, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Yeah I'm sure Yates herself will be fine, and she'd have been out of a job shortly anyway, if Sessions is confirmed which he probably will be. Fwiw, she was Deputy Attorney General under Loretta Lynch, so only acting as AG while the AG seat was officially vacant.   50.0.136.56 (talk) 22:41, 1 February 2017 (UTC)

Biz/Finance app
Now that Bloomberg has hideously changed its app (and the playstore is full of criticism), are there any other good apps that show global equities/commodities/currencies and possibly news? CNBC is meh. Lihaas (talk) 06:01, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Yahoo Finance used to be ok, though anything Yahoo related presumably sucks now. Not sure if they had a mobile app, if that's what you're asking. 50.0.136.56 (talk) 22:08, 1 February 2017 (UTC)

Excluding Texas + California, were there American settlers in Mexico in the early 19th century?
Excluding Texas + California, were there American settlers in Mexico in the early 19th century?

If so, where exactly did they settle, what were their numbers, and what were their occupations?

(Basically, the context of this question is that I know that some Americans settled in both Texas and California back when they were still a part of Mexico--thus making possible both the 1836 Texan War of Independence and the 1846 Bear Flag Revolt--and was thus wondering if any other parts of Mexico likewise had American settlers in the early 19th century.) Futurist110 (talk) 22:37, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * What the U.S. received from Mexico in the Mexican Cession was basically 3 Mexican states/territories: Alta California, Tejas, and Santa Fe de Nuevo México. The borders of the modern U.S. States carved out of those three territories don't bear much connection to their historic borders.  Empresarios did settle Nuevo México after Texas Independence, as noted at Texan Santa Fe Expedition; they would have been Texians and not Americans, strictly speaking.  You can also look in places like History of Arizona and History of New Mexico for pre-cession settlements, Arizona seems mostly "no" and New Mexico seems mostly "yes", as noted in those articles.  -- Jayron 32 23:58, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * American immigration to Mexico mentions some Native Americans who left U.S. territories for northern Mexico by 1850. Rmhermen (talk) 04:08, 2 February 2017 (UTC)

Reliable sources that give a positive view of trump
Are there any reliable sources that give a positive view of Donald Trump?71.80.197.47 (talk) 23:58, 1 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Yes or no for any given value of "reliable" and "positive". What sort of sources do you seek, specifically?  You can easily find any number of sources in support of Trump.  -- Jayron 32 00:00, 2 February 2017 (UTC)

Reliable sources that support his plan to build a border wall with Mexico or his temporary ban on refugees from certain Muslim countries.71.80.197.47 (talk) 00:05, 2 February 2017 (UTC)
 * (slightly off-topic) here is the roll call for the Secure Fence Act of 2006, where Clinton voted Yes. https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/109-2006/s262 Sir Joseph (talk) 00:12, 2 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Again, reliable to what end? There are sources which express their own earnest opinions in support of such moves.  You can easily find them in any Google search.  They are reliable insofar as you can trust that the opinion is really the opinion of the person who is writing the opinion.  If you let us know what the purpose of the sources are and what you need it for, you can help us find those sources that meet your need.  -- Jayron <b style="color:#090">32</b> 00:13, 2 February 2017 (UTC)
 * I thought the requests was for WP:RS, i.e. to use in wikipedia articles. There will be op-ed columns in big newspapers both for and against the wall etc.  So that would be a place to look.  You (OP) probably want articles by authors who are the subjects of wikipedia biographies, so you can write "So-and-so writes in the Washington Post, 'it will be a great wall, even greater than the Chinese one'" or whatever So-and-so says.  And you'd wikilink to the author's name so readers could click on it and see who they were.  Try to pick someone who's perceived as reasonably mainstream, but for this type of thing there's some latitude. 50.0.136.56 (talk) 08:49, 2 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Reliable sources to use HOW in Wikipedia articles? There is no blanket source which is reliable for all purposes to say anything.  If we want to find a citation for "John Doe said that Donald Trump is the best president ever!"  And then we have a verified website that we know is John Doe's work, where he says "Donald Trump is the best president ever!", then that quote would be reliably sourced.  We know John Doe said that, and we have verification that he said that.  What we cannot do is, in Wikipedia's voice use John Doe's words to make general statements about Donald Trump.  Again, we need to know for what purpose we're citing the source.  Furthermore, reliability has nothing to do with relevance.  If John Doe were a well-established historian, or political commentator, or something like that, his verifiably sourced quote may be relevant to the article.  If John Doe is some teenager living in his mom's basement, even if we have a reliable source for his opinion, his opinion is irrelevant.  -- Jayron <b style="color:#090">32</b> 13:42, 2 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Of course we could never use Wikipedia's voice for something like that no matter who said it, since it's a far-from-universal opinion. The idea under our neutrality principle is to document the range of viewpoints that are out there, by giving some representative samples across the spectrum with in-text attribution.  The RS criteria then is basically that the publishing outlet be selective enough (e.g. major mainstream newspaper) that getting something published in it is a marker in its own right of the opinion's notability.  It also helps a lot if there are secondary RS commenting on So-and-so having said that thing, and that So-and-so himself/herself is notable (WP bio exists).  If John Doe is a teenager in his mom's basement there wouldn't normally be a WP biography of him documenting his (nonexistent) notability, and there won't be secondary sources discussing his opinion of the wall.  50.0.136.56 (talk) 16:28, 2 February 2017 (UTC)