Wikipedia talk:WikiProject US State Legislatures

Inconsistency in state senate district article titles

I noticed that some state senate district articles have inconsistent titles. For example, some are titled "State's Xth Senate district" (such as Illinois's 13th Senate district), while others are titled "State's Xth State Senate district" (such as California's 1st State Senate district). Which one is preferable? Kornatice (talk) 21:48, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

@Kornatice: Hello. What you noted is real, but isn't an inconsistency. Different state senates have different names. The Illinois upper house calls itself the "Illinois Senate", while California's upper house calls itself the "California State Senate". Different states call their upper houses different things. It seems the general rule is to name the district pages after the name of the state's upper house. For instance, Colorado has the "Colorado Senate", therefore its senate district article titles are "Colorado's Xth Senate district". I have noticed that many states call their senate districts "senatorial districts", and perhaps we should start to change titles to that, but I haven't proposed that anywhere, and there's been consensus on that as of yet. For right now, I recommend sticking with how they are now.

Let me know if that was confusing at all, or if you have any further questions. –  RoundSquare (talk) 22:07, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

Thanks for the explanation. Kornatice (talk) 22:11, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

But by what virtue does California call its senate the "California State Senate?" I only see that really on its website. It's not called that in its constitution. --PerpetuityGrat (talk) 23:52, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

@PerpetuityGrat: Hello. If the California State Senate calls itself that, then I think that is a virtue in and of itself. If its not specified in the state constitution, I don't know what other mechanism would give it the name, but if the institution uses it itself, I don't see what reason we have not to use it. I assume each state legislature Wikipedia article title was given the specific title it has for similar reasons. Each one I've looked into is consistent with how the institution self-identifies. You're free to look into the question of how the institutions got their names yourself. –  RoundSquare (talk) 00:38, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

I noticed a new discrepancy. The title of the article for Wisconsin's upper house is "Wisconsin Senate", but its districts' articles include the "State" (e.g. Wisconsin's 33rd State Senate district) and so do the articles for its elections (e.g. 2022 Wisconsin State Senate election). Is there a reason for this? Is is a problem? Kornatice (talk) 21:46, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

@Kornatice: Thank you for noting the discrepancy. I've noticed there is a somewhat bigger discrepancy with the Wisconsin Senate as a whole. Firstly, the name of the article contradicts what the institution calls itself. Its calls itself the "Wisconsin State Senate". There was a conversation about what it should be called from 2007 to 2010 in the Talk Page. People note that there really isn't a consistent name to it, and several official sources go back and forth about it. This talk of names has made me realize something: the name "the United States Senate" seems very established, but the phrase isn't used in the US Constitution. It could just as easily be called "the Senate (United States)". I think there should be a larger discussion about what to call these institutions now. However, whatever we call the Wisconsin Senate on Wikipedia, it should be consistent across article titles. I don't know if we should move the "Wisconsin Senate" to the "Wisconsin State Senate", or if the election and district articles should change however. We need some standard to fall back on. Anyone whose reading this, please feel free to provide input. As far as I know, consensus should drive this decision. We may need to ping some of the more active members of this WikiProject to get some agreement. RoundSquare (talk) 23:12, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

This really speaks to a more broad discussion, since state houses are really not very well known to the public... a lot of uninformed citizens think that state reps/assemblymembers and state senators fly to represent them in DC. Many just don't know the difference between a Wisconsin Senator and a US Senator (from WI). TLDR, I think that the prefix "state" isn't even required in most cases, it's just to further differentiate. --PerpetuityGrat (talk) 15:23, 30 November 2022 (UTC)

Current Iowa Senate

I have created a new page listing the current members of the 90th Legislature of the Iowa Senate under page title List of Current Members of the Iowa Senate (placeholder) and have pushed a request that the page List of current members of the Iowa Senate be renamed as List of Members of the 89th Session of the Iowa Senate (or something to that effect.

Before I go an try to do the same with the State Representative List, is this an appropriate means of updating these lists? I figured the data in the current article is still valid - its just for a separate legislative session.

The redistricting of the state in 2020 in general has made for a mess of work. So any advice on how to preserve but update is appreciated.

Squatchis Squatchis (talk) 19:38, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

How to Handle Redistricting

I am looking for good examples of how people in the past have handled congressional redistricting on Wikipedia both on the district's page as well as on biographical data sheets (either State, Federal, or non-US).

Here's the problem: if a state has districts 1-50 and renumbers them every 10 years, then the wikipedia page for a single district, would likely follow the number around, instead of the geographical area. This would lead to the apparent fallacy that a numerical district changed parties every 10 years or so. Or that a biographical page shows a legislature representing the correct numerical district, but the incorrect geographical area.

Possible solutions that I've thought of: 1. Wikipedia should first and foremost reflect the here and now and the existing pages should be modified to reflect current redistricting. The historic record is secondary. (easiest logistically/most subject to historic inaccuracies) 2. Every 10 years (or as needed) create a brand new set of district pages tabulated by year. e.g. District 1 (current); District 1 (2010-2020); District 1 (2000-2010); etc. Ideally biographical data would then link to the correct district in time and space. (hardest logistically/most accurate) 3. Create #1, but include with it a sub-section on redistricting. (Middle of the road) Squatchis (talk) 21:56, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

@Squatchis: Hello. Redistricting is a kind of pain when it comes to the subject of our WikiProject. Seeing as this is a problem facing the US Congress pages too, I think you should raise a similar thread at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject U.S. Congress.

As for what solution I think is best: I think both historical and current information is imperative for a district's wiki article. I do not think that your second proposed solution is really plausible. I'm not sure many outside of this WikiProject would consider individual iterations of districts to be notable enough for their own articles. I like Solution 1 the most, but I also kind of feel like that is what most of the district pages are now, right? For instance, the Michigan state house districts are pages that I've been working on. Here's an example of one here: Michigan's 42nd House of Representatives district. It first and foremost reflects the district's current boundaries. It also contains a subsection on the historical boundaries of the district, describing all the shapes the district has been in throughout its history. Now, not all the state legislative districts articles have a good record of their historical boundaries, but I've always assumed a list of historical boundaries are the norm on an article if one happens to have the information. Historical boundaries lists are common on US Congress district pages.

As for biographical articles, I'm not sure I see the problem you're hinting at. Is it that, hypothetically, someone could be reading an article about a state legislator from 1972, click on the link to the district from the legislator's article, and be presented with the current borders first and foremost instead of the borders from 1970-1980? I guess that is something of a problem, but I think a very simple fix is available of just specifying early on in district articles when the current district borders were drawn. For instance, saying "as dictated by the 2020 apportionment plan, the 44th district is located in parts of Allegan and Kalamazoo County." It COULD be helpful to have a section explaining redistricting on each article, but I don't think that sort of thing is generally considered acceptable. For instance, each article about "Abortion in X US State" used to have a section explaining the terminology of abortion, however, it was decided that the information was not specific enough to each article, and it was removed by consensus (see here) a while ago. RoundSquare (talk) 22:20, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

@RoundSquare: that Michigan 42nd House District is a great example. I'm primarily working on Iowa state politics right now which does not have that level of historical data.

(e.g. Iowa Senate District 3)

I also agree that option 1 is probably the priority currently (as in get the pages to reflect current reality) and then once that is complete add in the historic record as time permits.

I guess my problem with biographical data sheets is two fold:

1. As you mentioned, a 'historic figure' who represented a district, when you click on that district, the page does not perhaps reflect what the geographical area was for that figure. But as you pointed out, including a geographic portion like that in MI-42 would solve that issue.

2. For persons who span redistricting. On January 8th they are the Representative of district 1, on January 9th they are the Representative of district 2. Their district has likely changed only slightly geographically, but the number HAS changed. Is that worthy of a separate line in their bio?

I've made an example showing different possible forms. See Jason Schultz Squatchis (talk) 22:58, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

@Squatchis: I now have a better idea of what you mean, thank you for this. In regard to Iowa and states like it, the only way to clarify the geographical relation of legislator and district is to find the historical data. This probably won't be easy, but I think the easiest way to start is to record on each legislative district page is to record the previous district boundaries. We may not have a full list of the district boundaries, but we know what they are now, and what they were last redistricting cycle. Its okay for historical district sections to be incomplete. Most US Congress historical districts are. An incomplete geography section is better than a non-existent one, and should signal to the reader that these borders change from time to time. It might not tell then where the district of the 1972 legislator was, but it will let them know it might not be where it is now.

About your second concern, there are a few ways to indicate multiple different districts. I've seen some truly unintuitive ways to do it, like this one. I think we should work to remove this method, as it is barely readable. I've also seen the "different district, different office" approach, an example here and its the one I've used for a long time. However, I do think the one office approach, as seen here is the best approach now. It is efficient with space and readability. I think either of the last two I mentioned are acceptable, but that the last one is the best. I think we should try converting articles to look like that. I've never encountered resistance for doing it and it seems to be the norm for US Congress articles. RoundSquare (talk) 23:36, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

@RoundSquare:.

Oh yeah, I really like that third concise example. I'm on for making the current iteration to that standard. Thanks so much for the help. Iowa is marginally better now.

Best. Squatchis (talk) 00:22, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

@RoundSquare @Squatchis: I'm also a big fan of the third example for infoboxes. I believe it's the recommended use of the infobox. I've also noticed some people are putting (redistricted) after the successor/predecessor name in infoboxes if they represented a totally different area. Starrfruit (talk) 13:54, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

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Discussion at Wikipedia:Content assessment

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Wikiproject importance

What would constitute importance? I see unstandardized articles about state legislature topics. (Louisiana's 18th State Senate district vs Oregon's 52nd House district in importance). Would legislators have more importance because they are currently in office? (Mary Wagner, a legislator out of office vs Robin Vos, a Speaker of the House.) Masohpotato (talk) 00:13, 21 September 2023 (UTC)