Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Franklin D. Roosevelt

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[edit] Franklin D. Roosevelt

I like this article. It is a good article about a president. I didn't know much about FDR till I read this article. I haven't ever seen a better one.--Gangsta-Easter-Bunny 20:20, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

NOTE: This article has 50KB of prose as of 24 May 2006
  • Strong Support- A very comprehensive and well written article. No doubt, it can be improved, but even in its present form, in my opinion, it deserves to a featured article.Jordy 21:10, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Weak object. This is an incredible article- the only problem is that is needs reform of its references section. There are no inline citations, and the references section is not proerly formatted. Other than this technicality, the article is excellent. RyanGerbil10 21:31, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Neutral. If other people don't have a problem with the references, I won't make it a big issue. RyanGerbil10 22:23, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Heh, I'll make a huge deal about it; see below =). --Spangineer[es] (háblame) 14:33, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
  • There are 16 inline citations already but there are a lot of main/whole article references which I don't have a problem with as long as they are used in the article's sections. It needs a more beefear lead though, and it could use a bit more encyclopedic structure. However, it is so goood right now... so, for now, Weak support. It is as it always was T | @ | C 21:36, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Support. Well written, good references. --Danaman5 21:51, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Weak support Two things, both of which are quite fixable, but this is definetly FA quality. First, the economics section needs some reformatting as those long lists of text coupled with the large graphs really distort the section on some resolutions. I'd say the graphs can be thumbed, as that way they won't disrupt a casual reader but someone can get the details if he or she wants em'. Second, as above, more inline citation with those refs is always a good thing. Staxringold 22:27, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
Done - incorporated in earlier economic section (New Deal). Sam 21:00, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Full throated support now. Staxringold 22:54, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
    • Comment. Dont want to oppose yet. However, the article is too long and tedious (Remember it needs summaries). Also, has an overwhelming TOC. Oran e (t) (c) (e) 22:29, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
    • Comment. Agree with Oran Orane :-). It is so hard to read these 100KB articles: about half that size is manageable, using the Summary Style. Sandy 03:23, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
      • Comment I've tried to fix this by consolidating sections and reorganizing some discussions (to put together his background, his family, and his paralysis, and to move sections dealing with economic legacy and impact of the New Deal together, and to consolidated the early political life sectsions). What is there now is under 15 major headings (instead of 23), and produces a total table of contents, with subheadings, about on par with Lincoln. I've also cut here and there, and incorporated a whole section devoted to other references in the body of the text, where they belong. Sam 23:30, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
      • Actually its Orane ('e' included). Don't worry, I forgive you :) Oran e (t) (c) (e) 04:01, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Support as nominator--Gangsta-Easter-Bunny 00:50, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong Support- Well written. Has lots of information.--Sabertiger 00:51, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Object - "Economic record" is poorly written and poorly formatted with virtually no text. A collection of charts and tables does not sufficiently describe Roosevelt's economic record. —CuiviénenT|C, Thursday, 18 May 2006 @ 03:54 UTC
    • Comment I've incorporated this into the New Deal section earlier and rewritten it; someone else made the graphs much simpler and more direct. Sam 21:00, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
      • I'm still not entirely convinced that this article shouldn't be shorter, but I'll give the benefit of the doubt. Weak Support. —CuiviénenT|C, Monday, 22 May 2006 @ 22:49 UTC
  • ObjectThere appears to be a lot of original research in the article. And, the section with the graphs appears POV (and possibly original research) because there are no graphs showing the negative side. The GDP graph from 1933 to 1945 is ridiculous --you don't see the bigger picture since the years around that time frame are excluded. There was a depression, but from the graph, it looks like the economy was booming. And, to be NPOV there should be graphs showing the unemployment rate --which was dismal through his term. And, the rising tax rate, and the decreasing number of hours worked, etc. I don't trust the numbers in the tables, either. RJII 04:06, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
    • Additional comment Also, there are huge sections of text with absolutely no sources attached. There is a list of books and papers at the end of the article but they don't link to anything in the text with footnotes. How do we know this the article not full of made-up things? I don't trust the information in the article at all. Some of us have just started creating footnotes, so there are a few in the article, but nowhere near enough. The article is nowhere near ready for being a featured artiicle. RJII 21:02, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Object. The Economic record section is a disgrace. The Legacy section says nothing about his legacy except the classic line "Roosevelt's greatest legacy was the sense of hope that it gave people mired in what seemed like endless economic despair." This is touching, but not encyclopedic. The rest of the section just says where he ranks in lists of presidents. What was/is his legacy? HenryFlower 11:00, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Support This article is flawless. There's no need to say more. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.40.243.98 (talk • contribs)
  • Support An excellent article. Comprehensively written, very interesting, well organized and formulated, fine images. I agree with the previous two "Objects" - though these issues can be corrected very quickly indeed. Overall the article is of great value, and reflects the person it regards. --D-Katana 20:46, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong Support As per nom. Hezzy 23:26, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Minor comment some section titles are too kitcshy like "the path to war", subsectioning should reflect which terms certain events occured in. Otherwise, great. savidan(talk) (e@) 00:28, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Support. My biggest problem with this was the headers, which I fixed. I like it now.--HereToHelp 01:09, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
Comment 'Henry James' can also be improved.--Gangsta-Easter-Bunny 13:11, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong Object—Many major concerns. This is unbelievably long (please see WP:SUMMARY), and the TOC is frightening. Worse, the are no inline citations in the level 2 sections "Early life", "Personal life" (now there's one), "Early political career", "Governor of New York, 1928-1932", "Foreign policy, 1933-1941", "Third term and the path to war, 1940-41", and "Fourth term and death, 1945" and "Third term, 1941-1945". Several others (including "Second term, 1937-1941" "World War Two, 1941-1945"!) have only one. Many sections contain uncited quotes as well. I know of 5 kilobyte articles that are better referenced than this. If you want an example of a Head of State article that actually attempts to do a decent job of referencing, see Hugo Chavez. That one manages to include nearly 100 citations and scores of unique references and yet remain more than 15kb smaller in total article size. Furthermore, basic formatting rules are not followed (dates, dashes, etc.). And what is "All surveys of scholars have ranked him among the top three greatest presidents" doing in the lead, or for that matter, anywhere? All surveys? Have you checked? --Spangineer[es] (háblame) 14:29, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
  • CommentI didn't like All surveys either. I changed it to most because that is true. And do you have to make a stink about everything, Spangineer?-Gangsta-Easter-Bunny-(19:38, 19 May 2006 (UTC))
    • I've tried to address a bunch of these issues, doing some fairly heavy consolidation and reorganization. If you've got additional ideas, I'll try to execute on some. It's a worthy page, with a lot to recommend it.Sam 23:53, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
      • Sorry, this is still extremely lacking in terms of referencing. The length is better, but still high. The lead fails to adequately summarize the article (3 weighty paragraphs please). And formatting has not improved—there is still bold text outside the first sentence, dates not linked, and unconventional dash use (the double hyphen instead of mdash, for example). I remain strongly opposed. --Spangineer[es] (háblame) 13:03, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
        • Good points all; I see four or five folks have been working to improve it, including you and I. I have the lead on my to do list; anyone who can add citations (especially good academic ones - using Google Scholar or Google Books if you must do the research on line rather than popular articles), I think it would help. I've deleted a bunch of unsupported material. Sam 14:00, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
          • Striking some of previous concerns, but more citations are still needed. Good work shortening this, however. Also, no need to link every single year that appears alone, just link full dates and day/month combos. --Spangineer[es] (háblame) 13:08, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
            • Thanks, I think its getting there, and agree that more citations are needed. Note that there is also a lot of support via internal links to other Wikipedia pages (some of which are well cited, some of which aren't). I'll add citations as I have time, but expect to have less time in the coming days that in the last few, so please, everyone, feel free to chip in. I agree that all the dates are a bit excessive, but it was in response to the peer review and we might as well leave them. If others wouldn't, please feel free to change. All the quotes should now be cited (or deleted); that was a peer review comment that I responded to. If anyone can identify any quotes that aren't cited, I'll commit to track them down or delete or replace them if I can't (Roosevelt's speeches, including the Fireside chats, are readily available, and most of them are even on Google Books - Hoover was harder). Spangineer, how do you like the intro now? I thought your comments were useful there before. Sam 13:24, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
          • The lead is better, but could still be longer. Normally the longer the article, the longer the lead, and this is still a pretty long article. As for quotes, it looks like you got most of them, but some short ones are still hanging around: "all aid short of war", "quarantined" (from the Quarantine speech), "Arsenal of Democracy", "his absolute discretion", "beating Hitler first". --Spangineer[es] (háblame) 13:54, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
            • Thanks - I think those are in the Dover great speeches collection; I'll either catch them at home tonight or see if I can grab them from Google during the day. I'll think about additions to the lead. Sam 14:09, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong Support, with reservations Yes, it's long, but FDR served twice as long as any other President, during a term that covers two defining eras of American History. So, the length is necessary. Yes, more citations are definitely needed, particularly in the Early Life and Personal Life sections, areas where there are two or three facts I'm just not sure about (e.g., the "deal" with Eleanor). BUT, this article gets very high scores for comprehensiveness and NPOV, and on a difficult subject to avoid POV. It is well written and very readible. (FYI, click the link on the "all surveys" question). Remember, the perfect article doesn't exist. So, it should be improved with additional citations, and that is my "with reservations", if these are cleaned up, delete "with reservations" and insert "strong" in front of support. (Gangsta-Easter-Bunny, you can address these things as people raise them) Sam 18:35, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Support: The article is comprehensive and well-sourced. It could use some more pictures, however. - GilliamJF 07:53, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Object Poor use of Wikipedia:Summary style (75K of prose). This article abuses use of 'Main article' links ; just link inline unless the 'Main article' is a real daughter of this article instead of an article in its own right (such as World War II). For example, an article on an individual battle (such as the Attack on Pearl Harbor) would not be a daughter article of the FDR article (and thus not merit a main article link ; let alone a whole section devoted to it) while an article on one of his terms in office would. A much more high-level treatment is needed here ; detail can be in true daughter articles (such as Franklin D. Roosevelt's role in World War II). Granted, this topic necessarily will be one of the largest we have and thus need to be close to if not a bit over the normal max size of 50KB of prose, but I think we can do a much better job of summarizing this topic so it is at a much more comfortable reading length. Detial is fine, but not all in one place; readers should have a choice as to the amount of detail they are exposed to. Also needs a great many more inline cites. --mav 14:22, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
    • CommentI made some changes to address this comment, deleting several 'Main Article' links but also creating one "daughter article" by breaking off the "Criticism of FDR" section and summarizing it separately, deleting unnecessary words and phrases and making sentances more concise in several places, and also deleting the discussion of Eleanor and Franklin's marital "deal", which I didn't see support for and which seemed like more detail than was needed. If people see other candidates for daughter articles or for a more radical cutting of length, I'm happy to take a crack. However, I think the strength of this article is in part its flow and tone, and worry about losing some of the shape of a beautiful tree by pruning too heavily. I've done some other consolidating, described in response to other users above. Sam 20:05, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
      • More summarizing is needed. The article is still pushing 70KB of prose, which is unconfortably long. I would suggest the creation of two articles: Presidency of Franklin D. Roosevelt during the Depression and the Presidency of Franklin D. Roosevelt during World War II. Then this article can have good-sized summaries of those articles. Also, the TOC is way too long and the lead WAY too short for such an important article. --mav 02:18, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
        • Ok, I admit it, I shortened the lead. But I took out fluff. I'll try to add back something better. My initial reaction is that I don't like the idea of splitting off the Depression and the New Deal; they are too integral to the key themes of FDR's presidency. I think it may be possible to make it more concise elsewhere - for example, the civil rights section might work as a "daughter" article. Time to sleep on it, but thanks for coming back to revisit, I'll try to work on some issues later tomorrow. Thoughts from others?
          • Looks better. 50KB of prose now. Objection withdrawn on this point. --mav
  • Comment. Can anyone fix the second table of the Economy section, and add the black border around the Cabinet table?--HereToHelp 14:36, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
    • Fixed the black border on the cabinet table - took a while to track down :\. Yet another lame sig I came up with T | @ | C 15:13, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
      • Oh, and the new formatting for the graphs...that looks so much better!--HereToHelp 01:08, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
  • CommentYou guys got to remember that he served 12 years, not 4 or 8, like all the others.--Gangsta-Easter-Bunny 16:37, 21 May 2006 (UTC)