Talk:Thomas Moles

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Biography. For more information, visit the project page.
Biography Portal
Stub This article has been rated as Stub-Class on the project's quality scale. [FAQ]
This article is supported by the Politics and government work group.
Photo request It is requested that a picture or pictures of this person be included in this article to improve its quality.
Ireland Portal
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Ireland, an attempt to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to Ireland on Wikipedia. For more information, or to get involved, visit the project page.
Stub This article has been rated as Stub-Class on the Project's quality scale.
(If you rated the article please give a short summary at comments to explain the ratings and/or to identify the strengths and weaknesses.)
Low This article has been rated as Low-importance on the priority scale.
Crest of Belfast This article is within the scope of WikiProject Belfast, an attempt to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to the City of Belfast, Northern Ireland on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, you can edit the article attached to this page, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and/or contribute to the discussion.
Stub This article has been rated as Stub-Class on the assessment scale.
(If you rated the article please give a short summary at comments to explain the ratings and/or to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the article.)

Article Grading:
The article has been rated for quality and/or importance but has no comments yet. If appropriate, please review the article and then leave comments here to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the article and what work it will need.
WikiProject Belfast tasks:
This article is within the scope of the Unionism in Ireland WikiProject, a collaborative effort to improve Wikipedia's coverage of Unionism in Ireland. If you would like to participate, you can visit the project page, where you can join the project and see a list of open tasks.
??? This article has not yet received a rating on the assessment scale.If you are a member of the project, please rate the article and then leave comments here to explain the ratings and/or to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the article.

Article Grading:
The article has not been rated for quality and/or importance yet. Please rate the article and then leave comments here to explain the ratings and/or to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the article.

WikiProject Unionism in Ireland tasks:

[edit] WikiProject class rating

This article was automatically assessed because at least one WikiProject had rated the article as stub, and the rating on other projects was brought up to Stub class. BetacommandBot 06:17, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Discussion moved from User talk:Warofdreams and User talk:Padraig

I restored your deletion of the section from the sucession box I fail to see what your edit summary refers to he was MP for Westminster as well as MP to the Parliament of Northern Ireland 1922-29.--Padraig (talk)

Hi - the UK Parliament succession box for Belfast South is correct. The one for the NI Parliament constituency of the same name is incorrect, as it was abolished in 1929, and he therefore had no successor, and of limited use, as it was a four-member constituency, so it will be confusing to attempt to identify successors for the other members. Warofdreams talk 23:54, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

If it was demolished in 1929 something I have to check then edit the sucession box section to reflect that not remove it all together.--Padraig (talk) 23:57, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
Except that it was a multi member seat - making an infobox clumsey.Traditional unionist (talk) 00:01, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
I have fixed the sucession box.--Padraig (talk) 00:09, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
OK, the new box is fine, but as has been pointed out, it was a multi-member constituency, so succession boxes are generally pretty unclear. If four members change at an election, who has succeeded whom? I've been deliberately omitting succession boxes for everyone elected in the pre-1929 constituencies. Do you have an idea as to how we could make the successions clear? Warofdreams talk 00:11, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
In this case he was succeeded by Fredrick Thompson in a by-election, Thompson was elected un-opposed. As for the pre 1929 elections that where multi-seaters it would need a detailed examination of the results to determine who succeeded who in some cases, some are easy to determine others not, if it can't be determined who then we should just put a ? in the succeed by section.--Padraig (talk) 00:39, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
Yes, this is the pre-1929 constituency we are talking about, right? The multimember constituency. There are some easy cases, but I'd rather go for consistency and either have succession boxes for everyone or no-one during this period. I really dislike putting a "?" - for me, that means that we don't yet have the information, not that there were several changes and the situation is complicated. The guideline I always use is that if it can't be properly explained in the succession box, don't use a succession box for it. Warofdreams talk 00:47, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
If the successor can't be determined then put un-determined in the succeeded by section, if you don't like using ?, taken the Belfast South constuincey as an example it is easy to determine between the 1921 and 1925 results who succeeded who, as of the four elected in 1921, only three stood for re-election and one of them was beaten for the last seat. So I wouldn't agree with excluding the section of the succession box, because in some cases it can't be determined.--Padraig (talk) 01:06, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
I'm no happier with un-determined, as it's basically the same thing. In your Belfast South example, who succeeded Crawford McCullagh? Was it P. J. Woods, or was it Arthur Black? I suppose there is a case for saying Woods, as McCullagh contested the election and was beaten by him, but it's not cut-and-dried - it is the sort of thing which needs explanation, so it's not well suited to a succession box. The issue of succession boxes in multimember constituencies has come up before, and the solution which has been used elsewhere is to list everyone who represented the seat immediately before an individual's election under before, everyone who represented the seat at the same time in small type in the years field, and everyone who represented the seat immediately after an individual stood down under after. That is unambiguous, works well enough for two-seat constituencies, and might work for the Belfast constituencies, but I imagine will look pretty awful for the larger ones. Warofdreams talk 01:13, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
Black succeeded McCullagh as he beat him to the fourth and last seat seat and P. J. Woods replaced McMordie who didn't stand for re-election, as Woods was the first candidate returned followed by Moles, then Pollock. If the successor can't be determined then the solution you suggest would work fine in those cases. Can we keep this discussion here rather then jumping between your talk page and mine, or move the entire discussion to Thomas Moles talk page.--Padraig (talk) 01:30, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
Yes, that is also a perfectly valid way of looking at it. I'm not aware of any tradition that states one or the other should be regarded as the successor - if it's to be included, I think it needs more explanation than an infobox can give. The "solution" I mentioned might work on the Belfast constituencies and others with four members - we could certainly give it a go and see how it looks - but I'm very doubtful it will look comprehensible on eight-member seats such as Down or Fermanagh and Tyrone. Of course, we could just choose not to have succession boxes for those constituencies, and that would be fine with me. Warofdreams talk 01:51, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
I think its best to determine each case as they occur and discuss any problem ones in the article talk page to work out the best solution in that case, I can only see that being a minority of cases as most should be easily determined.--Padraig (talk) 02:06, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
Well, I think we can at least agree that there's no harm in giving it a go and seeing what problems arise. Warofdreams talk 02:10, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
I most cases changes came about either through retirement/promotion to being judge etc or death, which resulted in by-elections in which many candidates where un-opposed, its only a small number that came about as a result of a sitting MP failing to be re-elected.--Padraig (talk) 02:18, 5 March 2008 (UTC)