Wikipedia:Peer review/Legal Services Corp. v. Velazquez/archive1

Legal Services Corp. v. Velazquez

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I have just completed significant expansions of this article and I want to improve it for future promotion as a Good Article. I want to pre-emptively thank the peer reviewer for taking the time to go over the article for things to change/add/remove, etc.

Best regards, Lord Roem (talk) 04:49, 15 January 2011 (UTC)

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Thanks very much for this article. I found it quite interesting.

In my view, the article gets all the big picture things right, certainly for GA level. It is comprehensive, covering all the areas that a case law article should, subject to a few areas where I think there could be a bit more detail (outlined below). The article uses high quality reliable sources, and avoids over-use of opinions as primary sources. I've only been able to check the couple of sources that are online. They seem to fully support the material for which they're cited.

The comments below are mainly nitpicky prose issues, although there are some more substantive comments. It's usually prose issues that make the difference between a B, a GA, and an FA. I have quite a few comments. That's no reflection on the quality of the article -- I'm trying to find as many areas of improvement as possible so that it can be as valuable a PR as I can manage. For example, some of the comments are about picky Manual of Style issues that aren't mandatory for GA.

Lead

• Isn't it a "decision" rather than an "opinion"? Admittedly I'm not a US lawyer, so terminology might be different, but see for example US law's only case law FA, Roe v. Wade.
• "At issue were restrictions on the Legal Services Corporation, a private, non-profit corporation established by Congress, that prohibited its attorneys from representing clients attempting to amend or challenge existing welfare law." The comma placement here leaves the reader wondering whether it was the restrictions, or the LSC itself, that prohibited the attorneys. I'd suggest splitting it into two sentences -- leads in particular can be excused for having short and snappy sentences.
• The abbreviation of LSC should come at its first mention in the lead, not in the second section of the article. "LSC" is used in the lead but the definition doesn't follow until later.
• As the lead should summarise most of the important points of the article (WP:LEAD), I'd suggest adding a further paragraph or two briefly summarising the reactions, subsequent developments, and academic commentary. A three-four paragraph lead for an article like this would be about right.

Background of the case

• I think this heading can just be "Background" for simplicity and compliance with point 4 of WP:MOSHEAD.
• "It aimed at issuing government-funded legal aid to indigent defendants". "The purpose of the act was to issue…" might be a better way of saying this. "It aimed at" is a bit ugly.
• It would be good to mention that the 1974 act established the LSC (assuming this to be true). Without this mention, the reader wonders how an amendment to the act in 1996 could affect the LSC. A brief mention of what the LSC does would also be helpful. The reader probably won't care to follow the blue link.
• As it is a fairly technical term, appropriation bill can be wikilinked.
• "to make a list of limitations on the activity of". This is a bit wordy and "activity" should be plural. How about "to impose restrictions on the activities of". The word "restriction" will then nicely match the next sentence so there's no possible disjunct between "limitation" and "restriction".
• "Notwithstanding the long list of prohibitions now applied to the LSC". I think just "However" would do the job here -- it's clear from the previous sentence that there is a long list of prohibitions.
• "Specifically, the restriction prevented usage of LSC funds for actions which:" "Relevantly" might serve the purpose better than "Specifically". Also there's a plural issue: actions versus initiates.

Lower court proceedings

• Who was Carmen Velasquez? A brief half-sentence would be helpful: many readers will be interested in at least the basic details of the plaintiff.
• Why was Velasquez aggrieved. Wasn't her claim just a claim for lost benefits, which wouldn't have been prohibited from LSC funding? Why was she trying to get legal assistance to reform welfare laws?
• "provision" - to remind the reader, it would be helpful to say "provision of the LSC Act".
• The last two sentences of the section split awkwardly. It might read better if the comma after injunction was replaced with a period, and the period replaced with a semi-colon. That would clearly separate different proceedings into different sentences and remove ambiguities caused by the use of "it".
• A sentence at the end of the section saying that the LSC appealed to SCOTUS would be useful, to segue into the next section.
• Why is the LSC the Applicant to the Supreme Court? In other words, what was their interest in having the LSC Act amendments declared constitutional?

Opinion of the Court

• As it is a full sentence, the caption to the Kennedy picture should have a period (WP:CAP). Sorry, that's probably the most nitpicky point possible!
• For the heading, I'd go with "Supreme Court decision". It's more than an opinion, and the heading should make it clear which court the section is talking about. Roe v. Wade which, as far as I can tell, is the only American case law FA, does it that way.
• "Court" can be decapitalised.
• The first sentence of the section jumps to the point a little quickly. Some other information would be useful, such as (a) the dates of hearing and delivery of judgment; and (b) the firms/lawyers who appeared for each party.
• "5-4" hyphen should be an en dash.
• "lower court's ruling" which lower court?
• "the restriction". A brief reminder of which restriction we're talking about would be good, eg "the restriction on pursuing welfare reform".
• "Justice Kennedy delivered the Court's opinion". Didn't he deliver the majority's opinion?
• It might be good to say Rust was a SCOTUS case.
• "In Rust, the government" The introduction to the sentence reads as if it is a statement of fact, when it is Kennedy's reasoning. It might be good to introduce the sentence with "Kennedy reasoned that…" or something similar.
• "upheld a prohibition on doctors". According to our article on Rust, it wasn't really a prohibition on doctors, it was a prohibition on the use of funds.
• "in the present matter, the government was trying to promote a diversity of private views with its funding". "the government" is a little misleading here because the relevant government (the Bush I) government was trying to stop that diversity. I think "the purpose of the LSC Act was to promote..." or something like that might be more accurate.
• "Under this line of discussion, the restriction had to fall." This seems to be WP's own view here. I'm not sure whether we need the sentence.
• The Court also attacked the fact that the restriction barred participation of attorneys in the Courts." I think this sentence needs to be more specific as the restriction was more specific. Also "Courts" isn't a proper noun.

Dissent

• This section mentions Scalia's dissent. I think it should mention that he was writing on behalf of the four dissenters (ie the three other dissenters didn't write separate opinions).
• "Scalia also took concern with the dicta within the decision that seemed to indicate a "fondness" for the concept of reform through the courts". "the decision" is vague - perhaps "the majority's opinion"? Also, "that seemed" needs to be attributed to Scalia, ie "that seemed to him to indicate".

Reaction

• "Specifically, Representative Steve Largent". "Specifically" isn't serving any useful purpose here.

Subsequent developments

• "LSC" doesn't need to be wikilinked anywhere in this section, having been wikilinked and discussed before.
• "doesn't raise a speech": "doesn't" is too informal.
• "the restriction on collecting attorney's fees": a bit more explanation on what this restriction means would be useful here, now that the article is specifically discussing it. For example, who is stopped from collecting attorney's fees, and from which attorneys?
• "new 'conditions' principle in Velazquez - a distortion of speech test - which they argued": hyphens should be em dashes. And "conditions" should also be in double quotate marks (for consistency through the article). There are a couple of other examples through the article as well.
• "Both courts of appeal" Which courts? The earlier sentences don't mention that there were only two cases.
• "other restrictions are not based" I think "are" should be "were" for tense consistency.
• "Firstly, restrictions may be imposed..." I think the sentences from here to "...it is funding a private entity" would read better in the past tense.
• "the government cannot discriminate against viewpoints in any instance where it is funding a private entity" Isn't this qualified by the distinction with Rust. In other words, isn't it the case that there can be discrimination so long as the government isn't funding a private entity to promote multiple viewpoints?

Analysis and commentary

• Did any academic commentators give favourable commentary of the decision? This section discusses three critics.
• Rust doesn't need to be wikilinked anywhere in this section, having been wikilinked and discussed before.
• "Commentary on the Court's decision dealt with issues of distinction between the restriction in Rust and the LSC restriction and questions of clarity in Justice Kennedy's analysis." I'm not sure you need this lead-style sentence, which is our own synthesis of the commentary. The commentary can speak for itself.
• "attacking the Court's claimed distinction". what was the basis for the attack?
• "The article notes" conflicts with the tense in the opening sentence.
• "Because a factor in the Court's reasoning..." If this sentence is the view of the journal article, it needs a footnote.
• "analysis, renders" this comma seems out of place.
• "Government speech" decapitalise?
• "in this area of law" these words complicate the sentence: are they needed?
• "designed to private speech": seems to be some words missing from this Gozdor quote?
• "The critical question the Court faced then, was what the actual speech was being promoted". This is a rather awkward sentence. How about: "The critical question for the court was the characterisation of the speech that the law promoted".
• "Using part of his dissent". I'd say "Scalia" instead of "his" to avoid any confusion between Scalia and Gozdor. "Adopting" or "incorporating" might be more precise verbs than "using".
• "Gozdor argues" a tense conflict (eg earlier, it is "Gozdor asserted"). There are a few more, eg "He writes".
• "He writes..." There seem to be quotation mark conflicts in this sentence. For example, the single quote starting at "'in ways" never closes.
• "subsidy"/"hypothetical example"/"attorney"/"abortion"/"First Amendment": I don't think these need bluelinking: the first four are common terms. The fifth is bluelinked earlier.
• "With this understanding in mind, he concluded with a process by which the Court should have decided the case; a process leading to the upholding of the restriction and reversal of the Second Circuit." This sentence begs questions: what process did Gozdor propose? I'd suggest either removing the sentence or adding to it by explaining the process he proposed.
• "decision that the role of the attorney is as an advocate and that therefore, a restriction on the attorney served". The comma here causes some confusion. How about "decision that the role of the attorney is that of an advocate such that a restriction on the attorney serves".
• I'm not sure what relationship the quote from Sharpe about the interpretation of welfare laws has to the material that precedes the quote.

Cheers --Mkativerata (talk) 19:12, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Thank you soo much for doing this, I really appreciate it. I will get started right away. Regards, Lord Roem (talk) 02:52, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

 Done I have gone through each suggestion above and made the appropriate change/addition. Again, thank you for taking your time to help out. Regards, Lord Roem (talk) 23:41, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Good luck if you take it to GA! I'll archive the PR now. --Mkativerata (talk) 23:44, 22 January 2011 (UTC)