Talk:Personnel Administrator of Massachusetts v. Feeney

Latest comment: 16 years ago by RafaelRGarcia in topic "Case" vs. "decision"

"Case" vs. "decision"

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Re: these edit differences:

I don't want to get bogged down too much in what might ultimately be superficial semantics, but I believe the article is about the Supreme Court's decision (its written opinion), not about the case as a whole. The article lead, as is standard for articles about SCOTUS decisions, starts with a citation to the SCOTUS opinion, Personnel Administrator MA v. Feeney, 442 U.S. 256 (1979). This is not a cite to "the case"—i.e., the litigation as a whole; rather, it is a citation to a written court decision rendered within that case. That SCOTUS rendered a written opinion is why the subject is notable enough to merit an article. The article is accordingly organized around the centrality of that opinion being the topic. Postdlf (talk) 19:46, 10 September 2008 (UTC)Reply

A decision is not a case; a decision is contained within it. cf. Roe v. Wade's page. We could add a section detailing who's who in terms of parties and such, for example. An article is not just about the decision, though some writers, like me, may focus on that. RafaelRGarcia (talk) 21:44, 10 September 2008 (UTC)Reply