Talk:2018 Pennsylvania's 7th and 15th congressional district special elections

Merged from separate articles

Why were these articles merged from separate articles on each district's elections? I'd rather they were separate, to keep with the style of other districts' special elections. But I think I see why you combined them: because they're on the same day in the same state. They really aren't related sufficiently for the merger, however. Let's discuss. —GoldRingChip 22:04, 5 August 2018 (UTC)

@GoldRingChip: There was no merger, I wrote the page from scratch, and no page for either special election existed before last night, they just redirected to United States House of Representatives elections in Pennsylvania, 2018. More than just being in the same state on the same day, I thought it made sense to have a single article for both elections because they're both in districts that will functionally cease to exist as soon as the elections are held. Definitely fine with being overruled if that consensus is reached, but those were my reasons. Nevermore27 (talk) 23:48, 5 August 2018 (UTC)

Oh! I see. I'd created two separate redirects to United States House of Representatives elections in Pennsylvania, 2018 and you wrote up a single aricle in their place. Nicely done, thanks. But I do think we should make them separate articles. Frankly,  I was becoming a bit confused about whether they would be in the "new" districts or the "old" ones; and that would've been a real problem. You've written that they will be in the"old" districts, which makes sense. If you agree, would you please divide them? —GoldRingChip 00:06, 6 August 2018 (UTC)

I think I prefer my approach, but I'll gladly set up an RfC. When was the last time one state had two congressional special elections on the same date? Nevermore27 (talk) 00:20, 6 August 2018 (UTC)

Keep merged or separate?

The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

No consensus achieved on whether or not the articles should be separated or kept together after ~103 days of being open. TheSandDoctor ^Talk 04:00, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

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Before last night no dedicated article existed for the two PA congressional special elections that will be taking place this November. I created this one last night, and decided to create a single article for both elections. Here are my reasons for doing so

1. I can't remember the last time two congressional special elections took place in the same state on the same day, so had no precedent to go off of.
2. The elections are being held under the 2011 PA map which was invalidated by LWV v. PA, meaning that the districts will functionally cease to exist the moment the election is certified.
3. In addition, these are elections to the Lame-duck session of the 115th United States Congress, so the winners of these special elections will be serving their districts for a maximum of 2 months, lowering the stakes of these particular elections.
4. The nominees for both parties are the same as the successor districts for the regular 2018 elections.

So: keep merged or separate? I welcome your comments. Nevermore27 (talk) 00:30, 6 August 2018 (UTC)

• As creator of the article, my preference is keep Nevermore27 (talk) 00:31, 6 August 2018 (UTC)
• Lean keep; I think that neither article really has much to stand on its own; the circumstances behind both of these elections are similar as well be the effect of their outcomes. Just my 2 cents. Mélencron (talk) 00:51, 6 August 2018 (UTC)
• Separate: They are unrelated other than date and state. We have hundreds of other special election articles that are separated. I think the only time we've combined them is when the same district had repeated elections in the same year (when there were multiple seats in a general-ticket at-large seat; or when the winner of the first special died/quit/refused and another had to be elected. Many of these election articles are short (though not stubs) but still worthy of a separate article. We do combine general election articles, but not special ones. —GoldRingChip 01:47, 6 August 2018 (UTC)
• FYI: I'm not optimistic we'll get much more discussion from other editors on this, BTW. —GoldRingChip 13:51, 6 August 2018 (UTC)
  • Maybe not, RfCs bring in people I thought? Nevermore27 (talk) 14:04, 6 August 2018 (UTC)
• Neutral, inclined to simply leave it together. Neither is likely to significantly expand, the old districts are ceasing to exist, and there's reasonably related context between them. I would also make a soft suggestion to slightly expand the reason for redistricting, with a very brief mention of the minor fame of "Goofy kicking Donald Duck" being noted as one of the most Gerrymandered districts in America.[1] Alsee (talk) 01:05, 10 August 2018 (UTC)
• Weak separate. The sources mostly treat them independently, so there's little benefit to combining them; what we do have to say about them is better covered on two different pages and doesn't really seem to benefit from being combined into one. On the other hand, it's true that both articles are likely to be and remain stubs. --Aquillion (talk) 09:04, 10 August 2018 (UTC)
• Keep. Activist (talk) 07:56, 17 August 2018 (UTC) I defer to the opinion of the article's creator. He or she has thought about that issue, tried to gauge opinion of other editors. Seems the least we can do is to concur. Activist (talk) 07:56, 17 August 2018 (UTC)
  • While I usually don't argue these points, I'm not sure one ought to give weight to an opinion just because it was by the article's creator. —GoldRingChip 13:04, 17 August 2018 (UTC)
    • Even as the creator myself I'm not a fan of this reasoning. Nevermore27 (talk) 02:44, 19 August 2018 (UTC)
• Seperate the articles may be stubby but artificially combining two articles that cover topics largely independent of each other does not really help the situation, and is a sort of vague WP:OR. The current article organization clearly looks like two articles sort of stuck to each other and splitting it would make what is happening clearer. Galobtter (pingó mió) 13:48, 9 September 2018 (UTC)
  • @Galobtter: Appreciate the comment, I am curious what you mean by Original Research? Any information that refers to these elections specifically (i.e. candidate selections, chiefly) is sourced, and everything else is either also sourced or links to other wiki articles that have their own sources. Also I must respectfully disagree that the topics are "largely independent", no two congressional special elections have ever been this thematically linked. Thanks again for your input. Nevermore27 (talk) 05:48, 18 September 2018 (UTC)

    Because of combining two elections together despite reliable sources not generally doing so Galobtter (pingó mió) 16:16, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

• Was here to close this, but I don't see consensus. That said, there is no good reason for these to be merged, so seperate. Hobit (talk) 01:23, 31 October 2018 (UTC)
• @Nevermore27: @Mélencron:Any consensus, yet? Doesn't look like it. However, to go with consistency (if we must), then we should split these things. —GoldRingChip 17:12, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
  • @GoldRingChip: I keep coming back to the idea that a) the special elections don't generate enough content on their own to merit individual articles b) I still can't think of another time when one state had two congressional specials on the same day, so "consistency" doesn't necessarily tell us anything, and c) with nigh-simultaneous resignations and redistricting, these two special elections are more thematically linked than I think is otherwise possible. I am of course the author of this article and the architect of this unique article composition, so I'm certainly biased. But I don't think it's unfounded either. Nevermore27 (talk) 04:03, 17 November 2018 (UTC)
• Separate. These are two different elections with sufficiently distinct coverage in reliable sources to merit separate articles. — Newslinger talk 01:42, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Libertarian candidate in 15th

Why wasn't Tim Silfies, running as a Libertarian both in this special election and for the 7th District seat going forward, listed in this article? Zigwithbag (talk) 18:20, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

Apparently so, but I couldn't find any sources prior to the election, sorry about that! Nevermore27 (talk) 02:52, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion

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• Mary Gay Scalon, official portrait, 116th Congress.jpg

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 09:22, 19 January 2019 (UTC)