Template talk:Infobox United States federal proposed legislation

Template title

Hi! I've just reverted the title of this template to include the "federal" again. This template is not appropriate for use with state legislation - it was designed specifically for federal legislation. The template has a line that automatically generates the text "Signed by President X on Date" where X and Date are filled in by the user, but the rest is generated by the template. States do not have presidents - they have governors. The Citations section is also full of inappropriate fields. State legislation does not become part of the United States Code, nor can it amend the USC. State legislation also does not receive United States Public Law citations or become part of U.S. statutory law. Furthermore, all of the templates used within - USBill, Public Law, etc are for use with United States FEDERAL legislation, not state level. Including the "federal" in the title makes it clear what this template is used for. Some editors might be able to semi-successfully use it for state legislation, but they risk including misleading information that directs people to the wrong places or gives the wrong impression about the law. If someone wants to make a template for state legislation (assuming there isn't one already), they can go ahead, but will need to remember that one state has a unicameral legislator and some states give their governors the power of the line item veto, which means a piece of the bill could be vetoed while the rest became law. Thanks! HistoricMN44 (talk) 15:08, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

This template can be used for state legislation by just avoiding to fill all parameters which are specific to federal laws. It won't be too hard to add a parameter to display when a law was signed by a governor (instead of president), for example. The possibility of including misleading information is not limited by the choice of template: even in the current version there is nothing that keeps anyone from writing that a law was signed in 2040 by president Mickey Mouse or whoever. Creating a new template would not solve any of these issues, and it would add another name to the already long list of infoboxes in need of periodical maintenance.--eh bien mon prince (talk) 07:46, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Announcing that something had been signed by Mickey Mouse in 2040 sounds more like vandalism than misleading information to me. I'm more concerned that someone somewhat familiar with their own state and not familiar with federal laws will think that all fields could be filled in when they aren't actually all appropriate. I suppose this could be addressed in the documentation for how to use the template if need be. How would adding a governor field affect the 186 pages this template has already been transcluded on? HistoricMN44 (talk) 15:05, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Need to synchronize with Infobox U.S. legislation

This template's parameters need to be duplicated and/or synchronized with {{Infobox U.S. legislation}} to make it easier to convert the template when a bill becomes an act. If the editors are going to be too lazy to convert parameters for the template, then editors are going to be too lazy to covert parameters for every instantiation. Int21h (talk) 19:11, 24 July 2014 (UTC)

Well... why? There's nothing in the U.S. legislation infobox that isn't also in this infobox (the reverse is not true). All bills start out proposed... when they become law, why would you need to change them to a new template if all of the relevant fields are already there in the initial template? I'm completely confused as to what the benefits are would be to manually changing templates every time a bill becomes a public law. Why switch from one template to the next?

When we wanted to add some more fields to the infoboxes on legislation, we chose to start with a new infobox so that we didn't break all of the cases where the original u.s. legislation infobox was being used. I've seen several people try to edit that one themselves and mess it up badly. We avoided that. This infobox incorporates everything that one does, plus some additional features. Although it may say "proposed" in the infobox name, it can be used for proposed and enacted legislation.

I don't know how to "synchronize" the two, nor do I see the need to. Can you explain what you're wanting better? Thanks. HistoricMN44 (talk) 13:16, 25 July 2014 (UTC)

I am at a loss as to the reasoning behind your assertion that (1) this template has features not available in the other template, (2) this template is able to be used in all situations that the other template is used, but (2) you assert editors will never want to replace the other template with this template. Is this a correct analysis of your position? Or do you admit that editors may, in some situations, want to convert between templates? Int21h (talk) 18:35, 25 July 2014 (UTC)

I'm confused about what you want. Are you asserting that there are no differences between the fields of Template:Infobox U.S. legislation and Template:Infobox United States federal proposed legislation?? Because there are clearly several fields found in one and not the other. I can certainly think of situations where editors might wish to use the "proposed legislation" template because it has many additional fields for extra information. I cannot think of any situations where an editor would want to take a "proposed legislation" template and change to the other template, since in doing so they would lose (but not gain) fields.

The only time I've seen anyone make such a change was your recent edit to the DATA Act page. Your change added a nickname (a field present in BOTH the existing infobox template being used and in the infobox template you switched to), but removed lots of background data about legislation amended and agencies affected. You could have simply added the nickname to the template that was already there, and I don't understand why you didn't just do that. The only other change was the name of the template which readers do not see. Why was/is it important to you that the DATA Act's template be the Template:Infobox U.S. legislation and not the Template:Infobox United States federal proposed legislation? That's the part I don't understand.

What do you mean by "convert the template"? Why would it ever need to be converted? Thanks.HistoricMN44 (talk) 19:12, 25 July 2014 (UTC)

OK, this is an example:

Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act

Acronyms (colloquial)	FATCA
Enacted by	the 111th United States Congress
Effective	March 18, 2010 (26 USC § 6038D); December 31, 2012 (26 USC §§ 1471-1474)
Citations
Public law	111-147
Statutes at Large	124 Stat. 97-117
Codification
Titles amended	26
U.S.C. sections created	26 USC §§ 1471-1474, 26 USC § 6038D
U.S.C. sections amended	26 USC §§ 163, 643, 679, 871, 1291, 1298, 4701, 6011, 6501, 6662, 6677
Legislative history
Introduced in the House and Senate as Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act of 2009 (S. 1934, H.R. 3933) by Max Baucus (D–Montana); Charles Rangel (D–NY-13) on October 27, 2009 Committee consideration by Senate Finance, House Ways and Means Passed the Senate on February 24, 2010 (70-28) Passed the House as the Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment Act, Title V, Subtitle A on March 4, 2010 (217-201) with amendment Senate agreed to House amendment on March 17, 2010 (68-29) Signed into law by President Barack Obama on March 18, 2010

Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act

Acronyms (colloquial)	FATCA
Enacted by	the 111th United States Congress
Effective	March 18, 2010 (26 USC § 6038D); December 31, 2012 (26 USC §§ 1471-1474)
Citations
Public law	111-147
Statutes at Large	124 Stat. 97-117
Codification
Titles amended	26
U.S.C. sections created	26 USC §§ 1471-1474, 26 USC § 6038D
U.S.C. sections amended	26 USC §§ 163, 643, 679, 871, 1291, 1298, 4701, 6011, 6501, 6662, 6677
Legislative history
Introduced in the House and Senate as Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act of 2009 (S. 1934, H.R. 3933) by Max Baucus (D–Montana); Charles Rangel (D–NY-13) on October 27, 2009 Committee consideration by Senate Finance, House Ways and Means Passed the Senate on February 24, 2010 (70-28) Passed the House as the Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment Act, Title V, Subtitle A on March 4, 2010 (217-201) with amendment Senate agreed to House amendment on March 17, 2010 (68-29) Signed into law by President Barack Obama on March 18, 2010

I am unsure how this is confusing: you are wrong.

This infobox incorporates everything that one does

These two template instantiations above--as in the DATA Act edit I made--have the same information, yet this template does not display that information. I renamed no parameters. I reject your assertion that with these templates here, or in the DATA Act article, have I ever removed information, or has information ever been removed. Any non-display of information is caused wholly by the design decisions taken to inexplicably change parameter names, and/or not incorporate parameters, from {{Infobox U.S. legislation}}.

I reject any arguments that Wikipedians are incapable of editing {{Infobox U.S. legislation}} as erroneous and irrelevant. I reject any arguments that parameters should be in {{Infobox U.S. legislation}} but not this template. I reject any reasons to not include parameters from {{Infobox U.S. legislation}} in this template even as deprecated parameters.

And most of all I reject that parameters should be in {{Infobox U.S. legislation}} but renamed (which can also be taken to mean "not having the same name") in this template.

As for my solution: I think we should deprecate any similar, but different, parameter names in this template which represent the same information in Infobox U.S. legislation, and change them to the parameter names used in Infobox U.S. legislation. This is what I mean by "synchronized". I see no reason not to, and I see obvious benefit to doing so: This will make it easier on editors, like me, who see no benefit to learning new parameter names for the same information in two strikingly similar templates ("[Infobox United States federal proposed legislation] can be used for proposed and enacted legislation."). These parameters mean the same thing, yet inexplicable, for no good reason, have different names. Since you have rejected this ("I don't know how to 'synchronize' the two, nor do I see the need to."), and there are no other participants, I think the next step is to get a third opinion. Int21h (talk) 23:21, 25 July 2014 (UTC)

Reintroductions?

Should information related to reintroductions across Congresses be maintained within the Infobox? If yes, how? Right now, it seems like overwriting the introduction data/sponsor, etc. is the only option. I'm looking at Department of Homeland Security Interoperable Communications Act as an example. There are other examples: Gerardo Hernandez Airport Security Act of 2014, National Windstorm Impact Reduction Act Reauthorization of 2014. These were first introduced in the 113th Congress, but were ultimately passed in the 114th. Thanks, Joecarmel (talk) 04:04, 3 December 2015 (UTC)