Talk:North Carolina Attorney General/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: NSNW (talk · contribs) 04:04, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

This one I will do first. NSNW (talk) 04:04, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria

1. Is it well written?

   A. The prose is clear and concise, and the spelling and grammar are correct:

   B. It complies with the manual of style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation:

2. Is it verifiable with no original research?

   A. It contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline:

   B. All in-line citations are from reliable sources, including those for direct quotations, statistics, published opinion, counter-intuitive or controversial statements that are challenged or likely to be challenged, and contentious material relating to living persons—science-based articles should follow the scientific citation guidelines:

   C. It contains no original research:

   D. It contains no copyright violations nor plagiarism:

3. Is it broad in its coverage?

   A. It addresses the main aspects of the topic:

   B. It stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style):

4. Is it neutral?

   It represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each:

5. Is it stable?

   It does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute:

6. Is it illustrated, if possible, by images?

   A. Images are tagged with their copyright status, and valid non-free use rationales are provided for non-free content:

   B. Images are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions:

7. Overall:

   Pass or Fail:

A very well done article, I only have a few things to note for changes. NSNW (talk) 05:17, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

References

• 26; seems at first glance to be an amateur-written encyclopedia. How exactly is this a reliable source? It's only used for short, general statements on what the position is and does. Maybe find a better one?
  • If you're referring to NCPedia, I will absolutely defend it as a reliable source. "It is coordinated and managed by the North Carolina Government & Heritage Library at the State Library of North Carolina, a part of the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources." I suggest you read the rest of that link where it highlights who writes its articles and its institutional partners. As you may notice on that specific article on the Attorney General, "This article is from the Encyclopedia of North Carolina edited by William S. Powell. Copyright © 2006 by the University of North Carolina Press. Used by permission of the publisher." (NCPedia often republishes from the Encyclopedia of North Carolina). Editor William S. Powell was a longtime professor of history at the University of North Carolina and the publisher is associated with that institution. So the reliability of this is definitely high. As far as the "amateurish" look goes, I don't think the website has been reskinned since the 2000s when it went online, and this particular article is rather short because it came from a printed work. Direct secondary sources on the offices of state government which are not the governor are rather hard to come by, so the chances of easily replacing this source while retaining the same information are rather low, even for "general statements on what the position does" (the media often takes it for granted and assumes the average NC readership often has a vague idea of what the office does). -Indy beetle (talk) 06:19, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

Prose

A few quick nit-bits:

Lede

• "The office was established in North Carolina's 1776 constitution as an official to be appointed by the North Carolina General Assembly."; I would prefer passive voice in this occasion but it's just my opinion, rewrite this as 'North Carolina's 1776 constitution established the office as an official appointed', and 'to be' seems redundant, so remove that and continue on with the sentence.
  • Done.

History

• "The title "Attorney General" was used in colonial territory encompassing what became North Carolina as early as 1677"; missing a determiner, change to 'used in the colonial territory'.
  • Done.
• "The attorneys general in North Carolina and in other British American colonies served as representatives of and exercised the same powers as British attorneys general."; remove the second 'in', as it seems redundant. Also, there's an article misusage with 'as British attorneys general', add a 'the' before 'British'.
  • Done.
• "Most prosecutions for criminal offences were made the responsibility of district solicitors."; I don't know whether you wrote this in British or American English but since this is an article about an American state I think it would be better to use the American variant of 'offenses' instead of 'offences'.
  • Done.

Powers and duties

• "They are seventh in line of succession to the governor."; another missing determiner, rewrite it as 'seventh in the line of succession'.
  • Done.

That's all I've got. This took barely a few hours and will get to the other nominations tomorrow. NSNW (talk) 05:34, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

• • @NSNW: I've responded to your comments. Thank you for reviewing this, let me know if you have any more questions or concerns. -Indy beetle (talk) 06:32, 29 January 2023 (UTC)