Wikipedia:Peer review/Tobias Watkins/archive1

Tobias Watkins

I created this article about a month ago and have improved it some since then. I'm now pretty confident that it covers the breadth of the available scholarship on the subject in a way that fits Wikipedia's best practices, but I would really appreciate a few more people taking a look at the article to let me know any issues I'm not seeing because I've perhaps become to close to the product: POV, clarity, typos, anything that sounds questionable, etc. I believe he's an interesting marginal figure in US history and worthy of a decent Wikipedia article, so I appreciate your assistance. If you're interested in medical/political/military/literary/legal crossover history of the early American republic and/or the Baltimore/DC area, this article is for you!

Thanks, Dugan Murphy (talk) 00:11, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

Eddie891

I'll take a look shortly. Eddie891 ^Talk _Work 17:02, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

• "from a Philadelphia medical college in" Does it have a name?

You know, this was just me being lazy, I guess. I took the wording from the text and didn't look into it. Turns out its the College of Philadelphia Department of Medicine, so I Wikilinked that in the article.--Dugan Murphy (talk) 04:57, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

• "Concurrently, Watkins served" concurrently with what, specifically?

I see how that's not the clearest way to say this. I just reworded. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 04:57, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

• we don't capitalize stand alone titles (i.e. "promoted to General" -> "promoted to general")

Good catch! I think I fixed them all. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 04:57, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

• "was reorganized following the war," can you be a little more specific? Was there a year?

I'm not so sure the reorganization thing is important here, so I removed that part of the sentence. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 04:57, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

• "under Joseph Lovell " maybe add Lovell's position?

Good point! Done. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 04:57, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

• "returned to private medical practice" was he ever in private practice before this?

I mention his previous private medical practice in the previous paragraph though I don't say much about it because I don't think much if anything is known about it. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 04:57, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

• "anniversary discourse before the" anniversary of what? Would 'speech' be more fitting than 'discourse' here?

I got that wording from the source I cited, but I see how it doesn't explain itself well, so I reworded it. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 04:57, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Update: After reading the discourse, I realize that this term is appropriate and I see that it was delivered on the college's fifth anniversary. So I'll add that now. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 02:21, 14 November 2020 (UTC)

• "on "every conceivable subject," i" who's being quoted here?

I am quoting Jones, the author of the cited source here. Because the citation is there and his is not a particularly noteworthy name, I'm reticent to fit his name into the sentence. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 04:57, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

• "Before The Portico he published literary essays on Lord Byron" shouldn't this come before the bit about The Portico, then?

Fair enough. I reorganized that section a little to flow more logically with the chronology. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 04:57, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

• Chronologically, it's a little odd for me that you've divided the sections so much, I'd rather see it divided a bit more closely by time, rather than only by topic, but that might just be me

I can see the desire to stick more closely to chronology, but for Watkins's story, I prefer to focus on aspects of his life separately. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 04:57, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

• "As Fourth Auditor he embezzled " any more detail on this?

Just a little. I added a phrase from Neal's autobiography about it. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 04:57, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

• "are relevant to the legal history of the writ of habeas corpus" I think you can go into more detail about the case here

My brevity here is caution. Not having a law background, so much of the Kovarsky article went over my head, so I summarized it. I did add just a little more since you got me thinking about it. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 04:57, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

• John Neal is linked on something like the fifth mention

I just went through and removed all duplinks. Thanks for mentioning it. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 04:57, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

These are my subjective first impressions. I'd say it's probably ready for a GAN or close to that, if you so desire. Don't feel obligated to edit any of my suggestions in, on the other hand I might be missing something completely. Cheers, Eddie891 ^Talk _Work 00:20, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for taking the time to read the article, list out these comments, and make some edits directly. It's so helpful to have an extra pair of eyes look this over. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 04:57, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Comments by Wehwalt

• "Between May and October of that year he traveled as far north as Castine, Maine" That year seems to be 1818 and Maine was not yet a state. I might express it as "Castine in present-day Maine" or some such.

In 1818 Castine was in the District of Maine and now it's in the State of Maine. Outlining the difference seems like unnecessary detail to me since Maine statehood wouldn't have had a measurable impact on Watkins's work there and I don't have reason to believe that people weren't referring to it as "Castine, Maine" at the time. The phrase "present-day Maine" strikes me as misleading; it suggests to me that Maine was still under colonial rule or that it was a territory. Do you have more thoughts on this? --Dugan Murphy (talk) 17:32, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

It would be more relevant, I think, to discuss in the article that Watkins likely moved to Alexandria when it was still part of the District of Columbia, though it appears he continued living there after it was retroceded to Virginia. Because that history is covered in the Alexandria, Virginia article, which is linked from this article, and because I haven't seen anything about how DC's versus Virginia's jurisdiction over the city or the retrocession may have impacted Watkins's life, I don't see a need to tell that story here either. But I would welcome your thoughts here too if you have any. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 18:02, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

• "In 1830 and 1833 Watkins made two unsuccessful appeals in the Supreme Court ..." It looks to me like these were not appeals, but petitions to the Supreme Court for a writ of habeas corpus. The second one, although it's hard to figure out exactly what went on, looks to have been successful, except that he was then re-arrested on new writs (Jackson clearly had it out for him) that it looks like he asked the Supreme Court to quash but that failed on a tie vote, but about a month later, the lower court freed him. It does not look like his sentence was extended, it is more that he was held because the fines were not paid. It's a mess. Can I ask what the sources say?--Wehwalt (talk) 00:28, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

When I requested your review I wasn't even thinking about your legal expertise. This is so helpful. I'll look into the sources on this discrepancy and comment again. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 17:32, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

To answer your question, the Cain article only treats Watkins fairly briefly on page 40, saying that "Watkins' unsuccessful challenge of the district court's criminal jurisdiction, and his imprisonment for an additional two years because he could not pay his debt to the government, seemed to signal a Jackson campaign against defalcation." So that's what I interpreted to be a sentence extension. The Kovarsky article is much more dense with legalese, way over my head, and deal's more with the historical impact of the Supreme Court opinions that with Watkins's story. Having just re-read it, I see that we are indeed talking about petitions and not appeals. My mixing up the two speaks to my complete inexperience in law. The section on Ex parte Watkins starts on page 794 and ends on page 804. Your tale of Watkins being successful in his second petition but being arrested again is new to me. Where are you getting that? (I so appreciate you sharing your expertise here!) --Dugan Murphy (talk) 18:45, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

I'll add that Kovarsky on page 798 says, "Tobias Watkins was convicted by the Federal Circuit Court for the District of Columbia—a superior court of general jurisdiction—and petitioned for a habeas writ from the United States Supreme Court. He attached his indictment and the federal judgment to his petition, arguing that the District charged and convicted him of a crime not punishable in the federal court. The Supreme Court decided Watkins in 1830, when there was no writ-of-error review for criminal judgments decided in lower federal courts. The appellate relief Watkins sought in the Supreme Court was an 'original' habeas writ; he did not (and could not) appeal or seek writ-of-error review of his federal conviction." I sort of understand what that means. It certainly corroborates what you said about Watkins petitioning and not appealing. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 22:51, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

@Wehwalt: Could you tell me a little more about where you got the story of Watkins being freed and arrested again? I'm hoping to tell this story as accurately as possible in the article. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 16:42, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

The last two paragraphs of this and footnote 6. I will probably have additional comments but I've been busy.--Wehwalt (talk) 17:21, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

Rad. I appreciate you bringing this to my attention. I rewrote the prosecution section to reflect this information you brought up. I would really appreciate if you could tell me if you think I got it right this time and if it reads well enough to make sense. And if you're familiar with Template:Cite court, please check my work on the FindLaw citation. There are so many numbers, abbreviations, and jargon involved with citing a court case that I'm not super confident I did it right. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 19:33, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

Comments by Mirokado

I've added a short description, by all means change if you wish.

Thanks! I didn't think to do that, but that's what I would have written. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 21:35, 28 November 2020 (UTC)

• "The following year he was appointed major surgeon at a Marine Hospital, which he served until June 1815.": Which hospital? "where he served" would be better.

I wish I knew what Marine Hospital. If I come across that information someday I'll surely add it. I did change "which" to "where." --Dugan Murphy (talk) 21:35, 28 November 2020 (UTC)

• "which many readers misunderstood to refer to ...": is there a good story about how we know it really was him? Never mind if not.

No story I'm aware of, unfortunately. Unlike John Neal (writer), this article represents the extent of my knowledge on this subject, so there's not really anything I can add in until I come across more scholarship on the topic. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 21:35, 28 November 2020 (UTC)

• "politics and electioneering,": even if this happens to be followed by a comma in the source, we are quoting the term, so I would put the comma outside the quote. Or is this an American punctuation thing? The same applies to the comma in "A.," (I presume the full stop there is part of the pseudonym) and the full stop in "Pertinax Particular."

Yup, that's American English. Since you added the short description and brought up this issue, I just added an American English tag (or whatever you call it) at the top of the article for consistency. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 21:35, 28 November 2020 (UTC)

• "$3,050": add an indication of its buying power or relationship to earnings at the time?

Good idea! I just added a note about modern equivalency. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 21:35, 28 November 2020 (UTC)

• Feeling persecuted in jail, he reported of a prison official being replaced by a "creature of the President" to deny him family visits and of a request from the administration "to have me removed from the more decent room which I now occupy to one of the cells!" : we "report something", not "report of something" (at least in the usage I am familiar with). On the other hand, without the first "of", "he reported a prison official" would imply the wrong meaning of "report". I suggest "wrote of" (or "spoke of") instead of "reported of". Also while reading the sentence I got lost about half way through, so at the very least we need a comma in "family visits, and of a request ...".

Thank you for pointing this out. I took your suggestions and I think it reads easier now. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 21:35, 28 November 2020 (UTC)

• "on the break of economic ruin": "on the brink of ...".

Precisely! I don't know how that happened. Fixed. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 21:35, 28 November 2020 (UTC)

• Just a comment, feel free to disagree: I would prefer "Watkins'" to "Watkins's".

I don't know about British English, but American English isn't consistent on this. I'm in the Watkins's camp, so I take that approach to apostrophe use consistently in this article. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 21:35, 28 November 2020 (UTC)

--Mirokado (talk) 16:36, 28 November 2020 (UTC)

Thank you very much for taking the time to read through the article! Let me know if you have any other comments. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 21:35, 28 November 2020 (UTC)

You're welcome. All the above fine now, thanks for your responses. --Mirokado (talk) 23:06, 28 November 2020 (UTC)

• The citation software parses dates so that you can use just the year in sfn etc even if a more specific date is given in the citation. I think it would be better to use just the years (consistent short notes, simpler source), thus {{sfnm|Gilman|1995|1p=64|Carne|1902|2p=302}}, {{sfn|Cain|1984|p=40}} etc. and remove the corresponding invocations of SfnRef. I have checked those two examples. --Mirokado (talk) 06:21, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for the tip! I'll clean that up. --Dugan Murphy (talk) 18:21, 29 November 2020 (UTC)