Talk:Members of the 111th United States Congress

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Members of the 111th United States Congress received a peer review by Wikipedia editors, which is now archived. It may contain ideas you can use to improve this article.

Homemade Todo List
key
	100% done
	0% done
	under construction
tasks
	expand lead
	delegates section
	match up senate and house columns
	external references
	leads for senate and house sections
	demographics section
	expand election section

Note

This table needs to be checked for accuracy in religous affilations of congressmen and senators. Many of them do not the individual articles for members.For example Ben Cardin was listed as Roman Catholic when he is Jewish.Bentley4 15:28 Bentley4, 4 Febuary 2007 (UTC) I started on this at User:Just H/110th Congressional Table. I'll probably be adding alot there and copy/pasting to here. Just H 15:44, 12 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Also, the demographics about religion err in identifying Rep. Stark as the only non-theist. Buddhists are non-theist as well, qualifying Hirono and Johnson for the label. 69.140.81.177 21:22, 17 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Two tables

Is there any reason why the Senate table shouldn't have all of the same fields as the Rep. table?--Appraiser 13:43, 24 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Nope. I had copy and pasted what there was already in there and I focused on the House first. Just H 22:33, 27 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

astrisk

In the list of House members, some of the start dates have an astrisk (*) next to them? Why is this (and we should probably indicate so in the article (unless it is there and I just don't see it. meamemg 20:59, 7 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

They were elected in special elections. Sorry, I didn't add that yet. Just H 04:40, 14 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Occupational background

There is a general statement of a blacksmith serving in Congress, but the only congressman who I know of having that occupation was Sen. Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island. He no longer serves in the U.S. Senate. If no one can produce another congressman who is also a blacksmith, would someone like to choose a different example? (A farmer, for instance, as in the case of Sen. Jon Tester of Montana.)

This only addresses the Senate, not the full Congress. The article looks like it should be about both houses, not just one. Shouldn't a section on the House be added, or should this part just be moved to an article on the Senate? Or maybe the title could clarify that this is only demographic background for the Senate. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.253.99.190 (talk) 01:51, 9 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I added a [citation needed] note to the occupational background section. If there's a source in the article, it needs to be footnoted. If there isn't, it needs a new one. 71.231.176.86 (talk) 07:54, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Hmmm

Good job on the separate states. I'm wondering if it would be easier to put in references there rather than in the main table. Just H^{editor review} 01:32, 24 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

senate classes

The class assignments for senators do not mach up with the numbers for each class listed on http://senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm not sure if there is a reason (or an easy way to switch it) meamemg 02:27, 2 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Photograph for Ed Perlmutter

The photograph in the table for Representative Ed Perlmutter from Colorado's Seventh District is incorrect. It shows a picture of Representative Doug Lamborn from Colorado's Fifth District.DarinJaneczko 18:19, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Years of Birth in Senate Chart

Did the person making this just sort of estimate when they thought each Senator might have been born? About of third of them are incorrect! DanyaRomulus 17:41, 3 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

HUGE!

Can't this page be split into many others? It has to be over some kind of size limit, especially in terms of memory. BirdValiant 05:24, 7 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm taking the split tag off for now, seeing as there was no discussion for 2 months on this. Also, the images of each member of Congress was removed, which makes the page much faster to load. --CapitalR 18:07, 10 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

House of Reps. Chart issues

The sort by college funtion of the table of representatives doesn't work. ---7/10/2007

Years of Birth in Senate Chart

I tried to fix those, but the page is too big, and couldn't complete the task. That was annoying. Some of those are comically terrible: Jim Bunning born in 1951? He was a pitcher by then.

Education -- names of colleges

Should they be listed in full or condensed? I.e. [[University of X]] or [[University of X|X]]? I had been leaning toward the latter when doing the Senate table, to save space, but with some of the longer colleges' names, for which a commonly-known nickname does not exist, particular in the House table, might it be more clear to simply include the full name of the college wherever it is given in both of the tables? What do people think? Qqqqqq 17:11, 20 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Images commented out

I've commented out all of the images for several reasons: they do not add anything particularly useful to this article; they drown out the other useful info and make the page very long; and they require an intensive amount of resources to load. If anyone has a bot or other Wiki browser aid that can actually remove the image code (instead of going through it manually), that would be appreciated. --Tom (talk - email) 18:25, 24 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

And on a personal note, I believe the page looks considerably more professional now. --Tom (talk - email) 18:30, 24 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I do not thing it looks better, and I will find out from several administrators what can be done to have the pictures put back. Politics rule 22:23, 29 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I agree, the page looked far better and much more informative and professional WITH the photos. I think removing the photos was a bad call. Methinks they should be reintegrated in the page. -- user:fdewaele, 31 July 2007, 21:14 (CET).

What do they add to the list, really? They make an already gigantic page even larger and drown out the important information. The images are already in the articles. --Tom (talk - email) 02:44, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Why is Religion included?

Religion is a collection of theories a person has faith in. Faith is a belief in the absence of evidence, or belief in the face of contradictory evidence.

A persons' opinion on Religion is no more or less relevant than her opinion on Chicago vs. New York pizza. While interesting trivia -- like their hair color or favorite dog-breed -- it is not relevant to their duties.

Perhaps the column should be changed to "Theism" (theist?); and the members should be listed "No" or "Yes", to denote those members who have a natural vs. supernatural world-view.

70.178.56.254 16:01, 10 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It's probably listed because it is a common demographic and most voters think it's relevant. 205.145.64.64 20:58, 15 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I also think it's very strange that religion is included. If we're putting that in, why don't we put something like what drugs they tried before (or during) their tenure? That's probably more relevant to many voters, no? Besides which, relevance to voters doesn't seem like criteria for it to be in an encyclopedia. I don't believe it makes more sense to have it under theism, either; I just think the information is not relevant to an encyclopedia entry. --aciel (talk) 04:28, 3 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Whether for better or worse, Americans do count religion as a important factor in elections. While I personally think of it as a non-issue, most people don't and therefore, I think its relevant to the article. I'd love to see info on drug use though, just for fun if anything. prinzwilhelm (talk) 15:21, 3 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I find the emphasis on religion strange as well, and probably inappropriate. Can anybody who supports the inclusion of religion in these tables point to a general-purpose list of this kind, appearing in print, that includes data on the religion of each member of Congress? Perhaps this information should be moved to a more specialized article.67.150.247.63 (talk) 09:44, 19 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How is there 1% blacks in the senate

"The Senate is 1% African American and the House is approximately 9.2% African American" I don't get it. Is it Because Obama is only half black? 1/50=2%, just like my milk. 205.145.64.64 20:56, 15 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Uh, there are 100 Senators, not 50... Simon12 01:28, 16 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

percentage of jewish population

article states that congress is made up of 13 jews in the senate and 30 in the house. thats 43. 43/540 is about 8%, not 6.9% stated later in article. 6.9 would be the percent in the house, not all of congress. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.85.180.166 (talk) 21:16, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Then fix it.--Dr who1975 (talk) 15:54, 3 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Barney Frank

Is Barney Frank's religion really "Queer"? His page quotes him as being of Jewish origin. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.71.3.76 (talk) 23:42, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for pointing it out. That edit was just made yesterday. I'm surprised no one had noticed it yet. In the future, feel free to correct such vandalism yourself.--Dr who1975 (talk) 15:14, 23 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Last names first

I'm sure everyone agrees that when sorting the congressional Members tables by name, it would be more helpful if it sorted last name first. Instead of "Amy Klobuchar" appearing first, it should sort with "Akaka, Daniel" first on the list (just like the Senate's Roll Call, or any other official listing of congressional members).

As I know it would be too big of a request, I decided to do it myself. I did BOTH tables. Also, to ensure that the Representatives had their "correct" last name I cross-referenced my edits with http://www.house.gov/house/MemberWWW_by_State.shtml

I checked it twice and it all looks correct. Hope this helps people in the long run. --Qwayzer (talk) 08:05, 14 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Congress' Total Compensation Package???????

Please print the total compensation package for each member of the Senate and the House of Representatives. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.182.180.83 (talk) 17:41, 26 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Find us a source and we might. Or better yet... you find a source and add them yourself. Everbody here is a voulenteer. We are not your servants.--Dr who1975 (talk) 17:57, 26 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

"assumed office"

This field seems to be being used in an inconsistent way for those who have served on several non-consecutive occasions. For most (e.g. Jane Harman, Baron Hill, Jim Cooper) it seems to list the beginning of their most recent service. But for at least one other that I've come upon (Nick Lampson), it gives the year he first entered Congress. This might be solved by making some way to indicate previous terms of service in the table. john k (talk) 15:09, 23 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that this inconsistency should be fixed, but I believe the best solution is to just change the year. The column is named "First took office" so it should list the first year each person took that office, not the most recent year they were reelected to that office. Hope you agree. --Qwayzer (talk) 07:09, 25 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think the choice here should be based on whatever the rules are to determine rank by seniority. I assume that this is the year in which their most recent tenure began, but I might be wrong. 67.150.247.63 (talk) 09:48, 19 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Obama as African-American?

While "black" has been used to refer to Obama, "African American" implies for many a legacy that goes back to slavery, which would exclude many American blacks from being African-American, including black baseball players from the Caribbean and black doctors from Nigeria. I think that the current consensus is to not list Obama as an African-American. 72.141.228.23 (talk) 11:28, 6 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Atheists and LGBT people in Congress

I don't know why this was reverted. I added in the intro to the demographics section that there is an atheist, a gay man, and a lesbian in Congress. It was labelled as "libel". This is not libel, this is fact: Rep. Pete Starke is an atheist, and both Reps. Barney Frank and Tammy Baldwin are gay. And since when is stating that someone is atheist or gay a bad thing when it's true? Homophobic perhaps? I'm changing it back. Hihellowhatsup (talk) 07:56, 8 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Stubbyfied sexual orientation section

I came across Should Our Legal System Use Wikipedia as a Source? which says that Wikipedia has been cited for the number of openly gay lawmakers. This article didn't cite any sources for any of them, and I've stubbified the section. If there are reliable sources in the individuals' articles, please use them here as well as in those articles. Thanks, Andjam (talk) 12:08, 15 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've restored the paragraph with citations for each one. Ral315 (talk) 07:12, 19 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. Andjam (talk) 09:20, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Error in gender counts

"477 members of Congress are male and 88 are female" -- That totals 565, but there are only 540 members (counting the 5 delegates). Unless there are about 25 hermaphrodites in Congress ;-), these numbers are way off. 141.156.183.244 (talk) 01:54, 26 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Demographics/Religion Missing Word

In the Religious demographics section, there's a missing word in the last paragraph. Should it be "first" or "only"?

As of a statement in March 2007, California Rep. Pete Stark became the [first?/only?] publicly-stated atheist in the history of Congress.

I think, based on the wording of the sentence, that "only" is better. I'm making that change (not fact-checked).

Unimath (talk) 06:30, 5 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

split Senate and House

This would take the size of this article down a lot. Possibily also split the demographic section.--Levineps (talk) 23:51, 12 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree strongly. I've been wishing for a long time for a separate U.S. Senate article. Besides, this article is super long. Hope other people agree. --Qwayzer (talk) 01:05, 20 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No, the article isn't too long. Congress is both houses, so they should be together. Wait until January at least when the information currently in the article will be moved out to a different article for the 110th Congress and this will be about the 111th. Reywas92^Talk 22:54, 29 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, upon looking at it again, it is too long, but most all of it is only tables. Reywas92^Talk 23:23, 29 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Creating Members of the 110th United States Congress from this article

If there are no objection I will be archiving this article to a new article called Members of the 110th United States Congress since we will enter a new congress next month and all the old information like members who left office and 2006 election result will be erase. Farkas2029 (talk) 03:14, 11 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think that's a good idea; I was gonna suggest the same thing. It's certainly better than simply editing the article, and losing much valuable information to everything but the article history. Lampman (talk) 14:09, 29 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Updating List

Hey everyone. I updated the list of senators last night and I am looking for help updating the list of representatives. Please take a stab at it if you have time. Optimusnauta (talk) 23:49, 5 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Franken / Burris

For now please leave the Franken seat as unresolved and the Burris seat as vacant as the ultimate decisions on those seats won't be made until the Senate convenes tomorrow at the earliest. Optimusnauta (talk) 23:49, 5 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Military Service

In occupations, is it possible, if the information is out there, to include how many senators and representatives have served in the US, and possibly, who amoungst them have attained the highest rank, and who may still be serving (national guard or reserve)? --207.114.206.48 (talk) 14:39, 10 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Steve Austria

Why is it that Rep. Austria (R-OH-7) is excluded in the count of asian americans? --207.114.206.48 (talk) 14:39, 10 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Formatting problem

The year taking office and year of birth for new Reps. Gary Peters (MI-9) and Dina Titus (NV-3) are not displaying properly in the Current Members table: the dates are instead displaying at the bottom of the Education section. I can't figure out how to fix this one. 68.194.217.223 (talk) 15:18, 20 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Original research

This article reeks of original research. Information are grossly outdated and there are no citation for any assertion. Seems like it just gets renamed every time a new Congress convenes. DHN (talk) 19:41, 23 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I don't believe there are any original research concerns with this or any other document outlining the various congresses. There are ample references for statements that are not readiliy verifiable or understood as common knowledge. Every little statement does not need its own reference.DCmacnut <> 20:12, 23 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Foreign Born

I will be removing Sen. John McCain from the list. He was born on a US Navy Base within the Panama Canal Zone, a US Territory at the time of his birth. I believe there is already a lengthy discussion of this on the John McCain talk page, an in many of it's archived pages as well.. Unless there is an objection this change will be made by me on 11FEB09.--207.114.206.48 (talk) 12:11, 5 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]