Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Henry Cornelius Burnett

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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 promoted by Raul654 04:11, 19 February 2009 [1].

Henry Cornelius Burnett[edit]

Nominator(s): Acdixon (talk • contribs • count)

This article details the life of a legislator who served in both the U.S. and Confederate congresses, and who is one of only five persons ever expelled from the U.S. House of Representatives. The article has already passed a GA review, and is supported by a number of reliable sources. I hope to address concerns quickly and see the article promoted. Acdixon (talk • contribs • count) 17:31, 1 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comments -

  • Per the MOS, link titles in the references shouldn't be in all capitals, even when they are in the original.
Otherwise, sources look okay, links checked out with the link checker tool. Ealdgyth - Talk 21:02, 1 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I assume you are referring to "Burnett" being in all caps in the link to the Biographical Directory of Congress. I've fixed that. If that's not what you mean, forgive me for being a little slow. We're still riding out the power outages from the ice storm at my mom's house, and there are eight people living here at present! I'm not quite at myself. Acdixon (talk • contribs • count) 23:05, 1 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
That was it. All done! Ealdgyth - Talk 23:09, 1 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Image review: Both images are public domain, with all necessary information included. Other comments: The prose is excellent; in that regard, this is probably the best-prepared FAC I've reviewed (I've done some light copyediting; hopefully it's all noncontentious). A couple of quibbles:

  • There's no follow-up to "Burnett declared that he was undecided as to whether he would take the oath of office if elected." Subsequent information allows the reader to infer that he does take the oath, but I think there should be something explicit.
Hmm. Hadn't thought of that. The sources don't explicitly mention that he took it, but that's to be expected. His taking the oath wouldn't be particularly noteworthy to most people, especially if they weren't aware of his threat. Still, I'd say your inference is correct; I doubt he could have assumed his seat without doing so. I've added a statement that hedges a little, but is probably as definitive as I can make it.
I'm not even sure that you need to explicitly say whether or not he took the oath of office. An explicit statement that he took office would suffice, and was lacking at the time I made my comment. Sarcasticidealist (talk) 15:37, 2 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • The lead doesn't say anything about his pre-political life. The rest of the article doesn't say much, either, but I think something should be included in the lead. Right now, the portion of the lead that says that "He returned to the practice of law" is a little jarring, since by that point in the article the reader doesn't even know that he was a lawyer.
Good point. I've added a sentence that should alleviate this.

Other than that, I believe this article meets all featured article criteria other than 1(c) and 2(c), neither of which I've evaluated. As a final and enormously unhelpful note, I'd like to say that Wikipedia needs more featured articles about subjects who look like bearded twelve year olds. Sarcasticidealist (talk) 14:28, 2 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the kind words regarding the prose. It's nice to hear after my first few FACs all drew a big, fat "needs a thorough copyedit". Maybe I'm getting better. Also, I don't know that the "bearded twelve-year-old" comment was "enormously unhelpful". After the week we've spent digging out of this ice storm, something that makes a person laugh is pretty helpful! Acdixon (talk • contribs • count) 15:32, 2 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
In light of the changes, I can now support this (assuming Ealdgyth's review of the sourcing is accurate and complete, of which I've no doubt). Sarcasticidealist (talk) 15:37, 2 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Am undertaking a thorough review, but "A lawyer by profession, the only public office..." Aiya! In the second sentence too! BuddingJournalist 02:23, 10 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    • I was momentarily confused when I saw "Craig, "Henry Cornelius Burnett", pp..." and looked down only to find no article starting with "Henry Cornelius Burnett". Did you mean the "Henry C. Burnett..." one? BuddingJournalist 02:54, 10 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I have corrected these citations. Also, I've reworded the sentence you mentioned. I added it in response to SarcasticIdealist's comments above. See if it reads better now. Acdixon (talk • contribs • count) 03:12, 10 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry Acdixon; forgot to do this one. I might get around to this one later in the week. BuddingJournalist 14:53, 17 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Fixed the references section and the grouped footnotes. The items in quotation marks in the footnotes are journal articles, not book titles. Acdixon (talk • contribs • count) 13:11, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Noted. YellowMonkey (click here to vote for world cycling's #1 model!) 05:09, 17 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Well-written, images appear fine, and the refs appear satisfactory from a quick view. For future reference, make sure you check that pesky WP:DASH page from the MoS, there were some small issues in the lead (I fixed them). Other than that, a fun little article. --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs (talk) 00:56, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the support, and it'd be great if you could clean up the image. It was already in the article when I started working on it, and my Photoshop skills are merely adequate at best. Acdixon (talk • contribs • count) 02:49, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Support. All the issues I saw have been addressed. Karanacs (talk) 01:24, 17 February 2009 (UTC) Comments by Karanacs.[reply]

  • Any details on interesting legislation passed by the 34th and 35th Congresses? It might be useful to have a little more details. I'm also not quite sure what the "Comittee on the District of Columbia" did.
  • Apparently not. The List of United States federal legislation has only one entry for the 34th and no entries for the 35th. Even if I did know some major legislation from these congresses, I have no information on how Burnett might have voted on any of it or why. Also, I don't have the foggiest idea what the "Committee on the District of Columbia" did either. All the source says about it is that he served on it. I included it to give a wee bit of robustness to his legislative career prior to the Civil War. Admittedly, it isn't much, but the only other option is to remove it altogether, I think.
  • Quotations need a cite at the end of the sentence, even if that means citations are duplicated in subsequent sentences
  • Fixed all I could find.
  • A lot of people reading this article may not be familiar with the American Civil War. A little more background in the first paragraph of Outset of Civil War section might be useful to them. At the very, very least, more wikilinks are needed (like on Union and Confederates) to help provide more context.
  • I may need a little help here. A discussion of the war's causes, etc. could easily expand into several paragraphs and stray badly off-topic. Can you give a more specific suggestion or an example of what you would add?
  • OK, I lifted part of that paragraph and adapted it to fit in the article. What do you think? Acdixon (talk • contribs • count) 03:12, 14 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • The article mentions that he served in the 34, 35, and 37 Congresses? Was he not in the 36th Congress? If he was, that needs to be mentioned, with a little on what happened; if not, then we need to know why.
  • Yes, he was in the 36th, but I didn't have any information about what he did there. I have altered one sentence that should make it clear that his service was uninterrupted.
  • "Kentucky's neutrality was breached, " - I don't know anything about this, and I am at least somewhat familiar with pieces of the Civil War. Can this be expanded just a wee bit?
  • See my clarification. Is that sufficient?

Karanacs (talk) 17:31, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the comments. See my responses above. Acdixon (talk • contribs • count) 01:15, 13 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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