Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates/Afroyim v. Rusk/archive1

Comments Altogether the article is very comprehensive and well written. Will support once these comments are addressed. — Ed! (talk) 12:55, 15 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Lead
 * "...after the U.S. government concluded Afroyim and other Supreme Court decisions had rendered them unenforceable." -- The court is part of the government, so it might help to reword this.
 * Background
 * "Concerns were soon raised, though, that this provision might be repealed by a later Congress..." -- Passive voice. Who raised these concerns?
 * Was the circuit court the original court or was it an appellate? It's not made clear if the case was introduced there or somewhere else.
 * It would be helpful to elaborate on the circuit court's reasoning for its ruling, and maybe a quote or two from the decision, as well as how it voted, would be helpful.
 * When did the Supreme Court grant certiorari?
 * "Gordon did not make a good showing in the Afroyim oral arguments;" -- whose opinion is this?
 * Opinion of the court
 * It might be helpful to elaborate on Warren's dissenting opinion in Perez, which you mention here, so people don't have to get sidetracked going to that article.
 * It would be helpful to include a blockquote or two from both the majority and dissenting opinions, though I know some people prefer not to do this.
 * "Examining the materials cited by the majority, the dissent argued that they were inconclusive and that some of them had been misread." -- Which materials specifically?
 * The last line of the dissenting opinion section would be aided if you included the part of the majority opinion which used the word assent, to clarify.
 * Subsequent developments
 * It's good that you have a note from Spiro, is there any other academic analysis of the case?


 * Thanks. I'm working on the points you raised and will come back here with a more complete response once I'm done.  —  Rich wales 19:16, 15 December 2012 (UTC)
 * OK, I've finished a [ bunch of edits]; please have another look and see what you think now. —  Rich wales 21:13, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

Comment, Good work, leaning towards support. Some comments. I'll intersperse my replies and colour them green to make it clearer which points I've dealt with and which remain.
 * I would delete the second sentence of the final paragraph of the lede. It's got nothing to do with the case.  I need to disagree.  The remark about the statute behind Rogers v. Bellei being repealed is, IMO, important as a lead-in to the final statement about the state of affairs since 1990 — by showing that movement in this direction was already happening much earlier.  To be even more thorough, I might also mention Vance v. Terrazas here, but this is the lead section, and it's supposed to be a brief summary.
 * Background
 * Does citizenship by naturalization have a Latin term? No — at least, not one that anyone routinely uses.
 * " apprehensions in Congress" I think the singular works better than the plural. My worry here is that "apprehension" will make it sound too much like Congress felt this way as an entire, monolithic body.  While this inference could be drawn from the cited source (the majority opinion in Afroyim said "The same Congress, shortly afterwards, evidently thinking it unwise, and perhaps unsafe, to leave so important a declaration of rights to depend upon an ordinary act of legislation, which might be repealed by any subsequent Congress, framed the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution...."), people would surely object that the implied unanimity was hardly present.  And if I say anything like "apprehensions by some in Congress", other people will accuse me of WP:WEASEL and insist on listing specific individuals — something that would take what is supposed to be a brief, passing remark in a broad summary and turn it into a detailed description of the evolution of the 14th Amendment, which would not be at all appropriate here.  For the instant, I'm going to keep it saying "apprehensions", but I'm still open to other wording which would address the above concerns (or convincing arguments that my concerns are unfounded).
 * "An amendment proposed in 1810" I would add after "proposed", "by Congress" Agreed, and done.
 * "struck down in another 1958 case (Trop v. Dulles)" Suggest "struck down the same year in Trop v. Dulles. Agreed, and done.
 * Consider mentioning who wrote the majority opinion in Perez. Since you mention Warren's dissent later on, you might want to give some detail about the result, so the reader can compare with the result in 1967.  Since several justices were around for both--by my count, Warren, Black, Douglas, Brennan and Clark--this is useful information for the reader, especially if there were any justices who changed their positions.  I added more material about Perez v. Brownell — both from the majority opinion and from Warren's dissent.  I also mentioned two post-Perez cases which called into question the idea that loss of citizenship could occur even without intent.  And I explained how Justice Brennan, who had been part of the Perez majority, flip-flopped and joined the majority in Afroyim.
 * " of its right to regulate foreign affairs and avoid potentially embarrassing diplomatic situations" "Right" is an awfully strong term given the Executive's considerable powers over foreign policy. Consider rephrase.  Agreed, and done.
 * It might be worth mentioning what the courts said about exactly where Beys was born. The cited sources for the birth info already include a cite to the court cases, which say Afroyim was born in Poland in 1893 — something which is pointed out explicitly in current footnote #27 #34.  I really don't think it would be a good logical flow to mention the court cases (which occurred much later in Afroyim's life) more prominently right at the start of the biographical material.
 * I suggest merging the first two paragraphs of the Beys section. OK; done.
 * I think it's worth mentioning which district court ruled against Beys. I take it it wasn't a reported decision, as it was not mentioned in the infobox.  I added that it was the District Court for the Southern District of New York.  I also edited the infobox to include the cite to the district court ruling.
 * " Charles Gordon for the government" I would precede with "INS attorney" or similar.  Even though you go into it a bit later, you should not let his introduction be without a mention of who he was.  That way you don't make the reader scratch his head, even for a paragraph and a half. :)  Rephrased.
 * I wonder somewhat if a description of the oral arguments should be in the "background section". I suppose it is, if you look at it from the perspective of the decision, but the article's really about the whole case.  The current consensus at WP:SCOTUS/SG is that oral arguments can appear at the end of the "Background" section.  This material doesn't seem, to me, to belong as part of the "Opinion of the Court".
 * An explanation of why Rusk is the official defendant might be in order. Because of the passport non renewal?  The article already indicates that the refusal to renew Afroyim's passport came from the State Department.  AFAIK, all citizenship cases since the early 1900s have named the sitting Secretary of State as the government's petitioner/respondent; none of the sources ever seem to consider it worth explaining this, and for me to do so in the article text would probably break WP:NOR.
 * Did the ACLU represent Beys below? How did they come to be involved?  Afroyim originally obtained the services of attorney Nanette Dembitz, general counsel for the New York Civil Liberties Union.  Dembitz wrote Afroyim's brief to the Supreme Court, but by the time oral arguments came around, she had been named a family court judge in New York City, and Afroyim's cause was taken over by Edward Ennis (who had been Dembitz's boss during WWII).  My sources don't specifically say that the ACLU, as an organization, had decided to get involved in the Afroyim case.  There was a line in the text suggesting that Afroyim had support from the ACLU, but I took this out.
 * I don't think you need to state Spiro's qualifications at such length. "Law professor Peter J. Spiro, in his 2005 article on the case" might be one way of shortening it while still telling the reader something.  OK, done.  Hopefully having the footnote cite listing Spiro's credentials will suffice to establish his worthiness to be cited as an expert commentator.
 * (in Perez v. Brownell) I'd lose the parentheses and just say "in Perez" somewhere in the sentence.  The reader's been told about it a few times, you don't' need the full name. Same for later mentions.  I rephrased this mention.  I'll take a closer look at other mentions of the Perez case and see if I feel comfortable with abbreviating some more of them.
 * "and much of the rest of the Court's questioning" ambiguity could send the reader searching back trying to decide which justice is not included in "rest of the court" Rephrased.
 * "that was not originally part of the complaint" Well, it didn't have to be in the complaint. It could have been introduced before the district court and been part of the record (had it been, it certainly would have).  Rephrased.
 * Were there any amici of note? Not that I could find any mention of.  I'll take another look, just in case.  I could also include brief mention of who was on the briefs for each side.
 * Opinion
 * "was grounded in a revival of Warren's dissent " Suggest rephrase.  Really, what's being revived is Warren's reasoning in the dissent.  Rephrased.
 * " repudiating the precedent set in Perez" suggest strike "the precedent set in"  Rephrased.
 * "The new ruling held" I would say "Justice Black held" or some such. Since you've just quoted Warren, you have to re-establish whose words these are.  Rephrased to say "The court's majority now held".  Black wrote the opinion, but the five-justice majority "held" the holdings therein.
 * "they wrote". I'm a bit uncomfortable with the "they" bit.  Suggest "he" (if you've taken my prior suggestion) or else "Black"  Rephrased to say "Black wrote".
 * You have "citizenship clause" here. In Background, it was "Citizenship Clause"  Fixed.
 * "a means of voluntary relinquishment of citizenship" I'm uncomfortable about the "of", but grammar's not my strong suit. Take a look anyway.  My source for this claim used the exact wording "a means of voluntarily relinquishment of citizenship", but I've tweaked my text slightly.
 * As you mention and fully explain the failed Titles of Nobility Amendment in Background, suggest you can be much more summary here. Rephrased.
 * "at the time". Delete, surplusage.  OK.
 * "from anyone" Delete also, same reason. Sorry, I disagree on this one.  I rephrased this to take out a superfluous "U.S.", but I believe it still needs the word "anyone".
 * Some explanation of why Warren's dissent was restrained might be useful, though I would mention it when you first discuss Perez. Rephrased.
 * "In their efforts to deal only with the foreign voting question at the heart of Perez, Afroyim and his ACLU advocates had studiously avoided any direct challenge to the idea that divided allegiance resulting from foreign naturalization might validly lead to loss of U.S. citizenship." Perhaps some simplification is in order.  Perhaps something like "Afroyim and his ACLU advocates had sought only to overturn Perez, and had not challenged the idea that divided …"  Rephrased.
 * Dissent
 * The two "U.S." in the first paragraph can be dispensed with. No one by this point would think any ambiguity.  OK.
 * I think scare quotes are disfavored. Suggest blockquote, or quote template.  I can't find anything I consider a true instance of "scare quotes".  Can you be more specific?  I did change one use of quotes around a short phrase that was not in fact a direct quote; perhaps this is what you were talking about.  As I read WP:QUOTE, it does not require, or even recommend, the use of the "quote" or "blockquote" templates for reasonably short quotations from a source.
 * "Harlan wrote, in part:" I suggest deleting ", in part" It's understood this is not his complete dissent.  OK.
 * Subsequent developments
 * Starting off with that short first paragraph doesn't' set much of a theme for the section. I suggest you start with the second paragraph and merge the information from the first towards the end of the paragraph.  In other words, mention both statutory changes at the same time.  I think it would work well.  I wasn't sure about this at first, but I see your point, and I've rephrased the material accordingly.
 * " inferences from an individual's conduct" Void for vagueness :) I think you need to be a bit clearer. Rephrased.
 * Bancroft Treaties" You might want to mention inline about when these were first brought in. Decade is fine.  I added the date range for the creation of the Bancroft treaties, as mentioned in my existing source (State Dept. FAM manual).
 * "mentioned the Eighth Amendment to the Constitution " First, "mentioned" is awkward. Second, all you do is say what you're going to repeat in a second.  Probably better to substitute "noted the prohibition in the Bill of Rights against cruel and unusual punishment" or something similar.  The reader may not know what the Eighth Amendment is, and this clues him in tactfully.  If you are doing it just to be able to link to Eighth Amendment outside a quote, then I'd say it's better just to link inside the quote.  That was precisely why I had used the awkward wording.  I changed it to use a wikilink inside the quote; this is generally discouraged, of course, but hopefully people will accept it in this case because there is no possible basis for any reader with a brain to think that "Eighth Amendment" in the quote meant anything other than what the wikilink points to.  If absolute refusal by some to accept this link threatens to lead to an edit war, I'll probably just remove the quote in question (and possibly go back to the source to find something less problematic to quote).  Unfortunately, I can't explicitly mention the Cruel and Unusual Punishments clause here because it wasn't explicitly mentioned in the source.
 * The quote by Dionisopoulos sparks something I was wondering about: public and foreign reaction. Both could use a couple of sentences, if not a paragraph each in this section.  If there was a diplomatic fuss, I think it's worth telling the reader about at greater length.  After all, the Arabs certainly would not believe the Court was actually independent.  Was there press reaction?  Anything interesting from law reviews at the time?  I'm hesitant to go into a big discussion of this issue, for fear it could sidetrack the focus of the article and take it too far into "history and controversy of dual citizenship" territory.  I don't recall seeing, in my research, any newspaper stories which were critical or denunciatory of the Afroyim decision, but I'll take another look.
 * I've been to Safed, twice. Beautiful place.  But I can see that Staten Island has advantages, too :)

Nice effort. Sorry about the length, but I don't see anything that should stand in the way of a support. Don't feel obliged to accept all of my comments, you know the material much better than I do.--Wehwalt (talk) 21:40, 16 December 2012 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the above. I'll start working on these points, though (understandably) it's going to take a while to go through them all.  —  Rich wales 23:05, 16 December 2012 (UTC)
 * OK, I think I've finished addressing your concerns. Please have another look at the article now, and let us know what you think.  —  Rich wales 05:47, 17 December 2012 (UTC)


 * Richwales, templates are discouraged at FAC because when FACs are transcluded to archives, something about transclusions causes double counting so that Template limits are passed, resulting in errors in archives (FACs get chopped off). I don't know how to explain that very well: Gimmetrow understands it.  Anyway, all of your green comes from the use of templates, that's quite a few templates, and if everyone did that at FAC, the archives would ... blow up because the limit would be passed :)  That's why templates are discouraged here.  Sandy Georgia  (Talk) 03:53, 17 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Sorry. I'll redo my green text in a different way, without using templates.  —  Rich wales 04:45, 17 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks for understanding; when one person starts using templates, pretty soon they take over again, and that will lead to the old problem in archives with template limits. I was just reading through pieces of the article, and noticed a lot of the pronoun his.  User:Tony1 may have some gender neutral writing tips somewhere in the guides on his user page; if not, he may have some suggestions to help not exclude the womenfolk.  Best, Sandy Georgia  (Talk) 05:55, 17 December 2012 (UTC)
 * I went through the article again just now, searching for and rewriting sexist wording. I obviously couldn't touch direct quotations, and most of the other uses of he/him/his were in reference to specific male individuals, but I think I caught everything else.  If you (or anyone else) should happen to see any leftover places, please point them out and I'll be happy to work on them too.  —  Rich wales 06:25, 17 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Thx! Sandy Georgia  (Talk) 06:29, 17 December 2012 (UTC)