Talk:Little Sisters of the Poor Saints Peter and Paul Home v. Pennsylvania

Primary sources are not banned from Wikipedia

Primary sources are not banned from Wikipedia articles. Their use in this article are: 1) a presentation of the facts in a legal case, the summary of the facts here are not being disputed by either party. 2) the presentation of the plaintiffs position as defined by the plaintiff and their lawyers themselves. No one is contesting either the facts nor that the plantiffs position is as the plantiffs have laid out, therefore there is no bias at play and the use of the sources should be allowed.

--Wowaconia (talk) 04:33, 10 January 2022 (UTC)

The edit that deleted segments that had amicus briefs which are primary sources was titled: " unfortunately, too much of this is using primary sources (amicus briefs and filings) which is not appropriate for court cases."

This appears to be an error about Wikipedia's standards as citations of amicus briefs can be found in the following examples:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fisher_v._University_of_Texas_(2013)#Amicus_Briefs
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Drew#Amicus_brief_in_support_of_defendant
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SLAPP_Suits#Amicus_curiae_from_the_ACLU
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molko_v._Holy_Spirit_Ass%27n_for_the_Unification_of_World_Christianity#Amicus_brief

--Wowaconia (talk) 04:46, 10 January 2022 (UTC)

Concerning your comment "you added a LOT of stuff

• Just because WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS, that doesn't make it right. Using primary sources in the way you are doing to analyze the case is original research, and we should only be using what secondary, third-party sources that have analyzed the case. We definitely should not be using amicus briefs or other non-ruling documents, since we don't know if they are fact checked. --Masem (t) 05:51, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
  • And to add, you can use a small amount from a primary source, but this should be to wholly support secondary sources that talk about the case or brief. Otherwise, that's running into the issue of promotion.
  • Now, adding to why the case was challenges/etc. is something that should be easily found in news articles and academic articles about the case, which you can use as appropriate sourcing. This may take a bit of work to find but this should easily be all online for a recent court case. SCOTUSBlog's own articles should help here too.
  • Also also, you added a LOT of stuff on the religious business side, but very little to the gov't standpoint, so that also gives the impression of NPOV. That's why we want to avoid using court filings and instead pull from news articles and academic resources which are more likely going to give a "both sides of the story" take on the case. --Masem (t) 05:57, 10 January 2022 (UTC)

I cite the Wiki-articles as evidence that it is an error to hold that the Wikipedia community doesn't allow citations of amicus briefs in its articles. Is it wrong to defer to the community, would it not merely appear that I was arguing from personal preference otherwise?

I do not understand how citing the Amicus briefs is original research here. These are historical documents, on file with the Supreme Court. So its not me that is suggesting that they have relevance to the case, it's the Supreme Court. A primary source can be used to show the thought of the person/group who created the work - which is what I did. For example I wrote "In an Amicus brief to the court fifty Catholic theologians and ethicists wrote in support of the Sister's position." I am neither misrepresenting their thought, nor dragging in documents that aren't part of the case. The Court holds that they are part of the case. I am not the one who decided that.

The citations about the history of the case aren't from amicus briefs but are Petitions for Writ of Certiorari - where the lawyers representing the clients are arguing that the case should be heard by higher courts and trace the history of the case while doing so. These writs are produced by the lawyers representing the people directly involved and are a necessary part of legal proceedings.

Why not tag the article segments as relying on primary sources and asking for substitution should secondary sources be found, rather then mass deleting everything?

• WP:PRIMARYNOTBAD

--Wowaconia (talk) 07:57, 10 January 2022 (UTC)

Again, just because some other court cases heavily use primary sources doesn't mean it is correct. We're a volunteer project, article updates are not constantly reviewed.

The problem with using primary sources on legal cases is that you are deciding what part of the court filings get to be included in the article, which is basically original research. You're making the choices of what are the critical arguments for or against a case, which we cannot do as editors. That's why we want secondary sources that give us these overviews, letting them be the ones that determine what are the most important points, including any content from briefs or petitions or even the decision itself.

In this case, it is impossible to know if what you're pulling is what secondary sources deem is the most important parts of the case, and as such, it may be completely inappropriate information to include, hence why it should be removed until it can be backed by secondary sources. --Masem (t) 13:30, 10 January 2022 (UTC)

Concerning your comment:

• //Also also, you added a LOT of stuff on the religious business side, but very little to the gov't standpoint, so that also gives the impression of NPOV.//

Well I was in the middle of working on this article and was working on expanding all sides of it and then someone came and started deleting most of the stuff I was doing, so it has set back my progress. I actually am tired of seeing people paint the whole things as the government trying to force sweet little nuns to pay for abortions - when the case is actually about whether signing a piece of paper is some great burden or not. I started with their side of it to consciously work at keeping things neutral. --Wowaconia (talk) 08:05, 10 January 2022 (UTC)

I have found a tag which is used to indicate that segments are overly reliant on Primary sources and need improvement. I added them when restoring the deleted text. It is my hope that this is a workable fix at least in the short term. --Wowaconia (talk) 08:14, 10 January 2022 (UTC)

Concerning your comment: //The problem with using primary sources on legal cases is that you are deciding what part of the court filings get to be included in the article, which is basically original research. You're making the choices of what are the critical arguments for or against a case, which we cannot do as editors. That's why we want secondary sources that give us these overviews, letting them be the ones that determine what are the most important points, including any content from briefs or petitions or even the decision itself. //

How is this a process that is different for secondary sources? We can't paste in entire newspaper articles, rather the individual wiki-editor has to decide what part of the article is to be included. I have never seen anyone claim that such a process was Original Research. One can raise issues about what was chosen, such as holding it gives undue weight - but the point that some choices have to be made seem to be a necessity and a given to the whole process.

Additionally, by providing links to the sources I allow anyone to read the source material for themselves, including other editors who are free to judge my usage in the wiki-article.

If one looks at my additions in the segment on "Material Co-operation with Evil" I cite the News agency Roll Call as well as cite the briefs. Why is that segment being contested/deleted even by the theory you lay out?

--Wowaconia (talk) 19:13, 10 January 2022 (UTC)

With legal cases, the concern of using primary sourced is that you can be trying to do a legal analysis of the case, which is original research. When we summarize secondary sources, they have already done any legal analysis, and so our job then is to summarize the major points of those sources, using what is typical for such cases, and watching what is UNDUE. We are also supposed to be impartial, and by using briefs and filings, that immediately are non impartial sources, begging the appropriateness of their use without having first gone through a legal analysis. --Masem (t) 19:26, 10 January 2022 (UTC)

Isn't that just a question of balance, not of primary source use? They are the ones presenting their take in their briefs - it is not us assigning it to them, only us making note of what they said. As long as we present it and cite it as their take in a dispute rather than declaring it objectively true. It could be unbalanced if we do not do the same for the other side, but if we do put both sides up how is that original research rather than presenting what they said themselves about what they believe? Are they not valid authorities on their own positions? --Wowaconia (talk) 21:18, 10 January 2022 (UTC)

By relying too heavily on briefs or other court filings, you are making a decision of what the legal issues are and which arguments are more critical to the case. We rarely discuss the content of briefs unless this is pointed out by third-party sources. And right now your additions are way too detailed on these positions. --Masem (t) 05:43, 11 January 2022 (UTC)

To note, if you access the Wikimedia Library Card platform, which you just need your Wikipedia account to access here [1] and go to the HeinOnline collection, you can find lots of law journal reviews by searching on this case name. Those would be much more preferred to discuss the nature of the case. --Masem (t) 06:08, 11 January 2022 (UTC)

Please cite any Wikipedia standard in support of your take on the use of legal briefs. I feel it is unique to you and therefore arbitrary. If you hold that the quotations from the briefs are too long, there use is unbalanced, undue weight or other such issues inline with common wiki-standards please lay them out clearly. I am trying to operate within Wikipedia's standards of consensus and good faith. --Wowaconia (talk) 15:59, 11 January 2022 (UTC)

See WP:NOR and specifically WP:PSTS. Briefs are primary sourced and we cannot over use them, particularly when there are secondary sources available. --Masem (t) 16:22, 11 January 2022 (UTC)

I am specifically asking about your contention that the use of briefs results in "you are making a decision of what the legal issues are and which arguments are more critical to the case." The logic in that claim if held as true would mean that legal briefs can never be used, as to do so is necessarily biased and Original research. --Wowaconia (talk) 16:33, 11 January 2022 (UTC)

Mention of Humane Vitae

Mass deleting the segment about Catholic opposition erases the mention of the papal encyclical Human Vitae, which indicates the level of authority being invoked by the Catholic opposition to the mandate. --Wowaconia (talk) 16:02, 11 January 2022 (UTC)

It was far too much level of detail and only sourced to primary sources to explain "Catholic groups see contraceptives as a sin". No secondary source talks of that because it is widely known why the Catholic church opposes contraception. This is a case of being WP:UNDUE in addition to OR problems. --Masem (t) 16:25, 11 January 2022 (UTC)

In Catholicism the faithful are free to use prudential judgement on many issues where different factors such as circumstances, outcome, and intent are to be taken into account for discernment. Unless it is an issue that has been decided upon by the hierarchy over them, such as their bishop. The highest authority is the papacy and one can not be a Catholic unless they are in obedience to the directives of the papacy when they have spoken authoritatively on matters of faith, morals, and natural law. Why is immediate deletion rather than discussion to be preferred? Are the standards for this article to be deferent than for the rest of the Wikipedia project--Wowaconia (talk) 15:29, 13 January 2022 (UTC)