The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

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This article violates WP:Content forking, because it overlaps with the Reconstruction Era article and a proposed Jim Crow Era article (see proposal at Talk:African-American Civil Rights Movement (1896–1954)#Move or merge proposal). It also violates WP:COMMONNAME, because scholarly and academic sources DO NOT use this term for this period of American history.

There is barely any content in this article despite being created on 8 October 2009. Consequently, the impact of the mergers upon the destination articles would be virtually unnoticeable. I support a redirect, merge, or deletion of article. Mitchumch ( talk) 06:30, 12 March 2016 (UTC) reply

oppose Many articles overlap and this overlap is only partial. The topics, sources and perspectives and dates are all very different, so merger is not called for. The RS treat the topics as quite separate. For example, much of the Reconstruction article is about how southern whites should be treated, and much of it deals with Washington politics. Rjensen ( talk) 23:54, 13 March 2016 (UTC) reply

@ Rjensen: That makes no sense. You state that "much of the Reconstruction article is about how southern whites should be treated". African Americans are treated extensively by the scholarly and academic community in the literature they produce about Reconstruction. It is categorically false to state "RS [reliable sources] treat the topics as quite separate". And you also state, "topics, sources and perspectives and dates are all very different". What are you talking about? It is not possible to read literature on Reconstruction without reading about African Americans. During Reconstruction, 90% of African Americans in the US were in the southern US. They were or nearly were a plurality of the population for many southern states. The Reconstruction Era is not NOR will it ever be "about how southern whites should be treated". Why would you deliberately segregate or exclude African Americans from the Reconstruction Era article on Wikipedia when scholars don't in their research? Mitchumch ( talk) 01:34, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

The literature on reconstruction covers many topics, many of which deal with the status of blacks in South. However much of the reconstruction literature does not deal with blacks Primarily, but deals Primarily with the treatment of whites: should they be allowed to vote, should Jefferson Davis be tried for treason, etc. That literature largely hands at 1877. The point is that the black experience Is included in the reconstruction era, but also deserves its own treatment, that extends well beyond the standard cut off of 1877. Rjensen ( talk) 03:57, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

@ Rjensen: "deals Primarily with the treatment of whites" - False. The literature on the topic deals with both groups as southerners and neither group being predominate.

"that extends well beyond the standard cut off of 1877" - The proposal is to merge the small content of this article towards the Reconstruction Era and a proposed Jim Crow Era article. Please reread my above proposal statement.

Please cite reliable sources for your claims. Otherwise, I will treat them as personal opinion. Mitchumch ( talk) 05:08, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

@ Rjensen: You can stop trying to add content in a mad dash to stop this merger. Your motivation for doing this are disturbing enough to report you on Wikipedia:Noticeboards. Either you cite sources that support your claim that the Reconstruction Era article is primarily about whites or I'm reporting you. It's that serious. Mitchumch ( talk) 05:34, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

I did not make any such claim, and I reject the notion that you can stop me from adding serious relevant material to a serious article. I did not create this article, but I think it's a useful one. Rjensen ( talk) 05:40, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

It is false and ridiculous to claim that this is an illegal fork. First of all there is no conflict whatsoever regarding point of view. Second the rules clearly encourage it: WP:CONTENTFORK states as an article grows, editors often create summary-style spin-offs or new, linked article for related material. This is acceptable, and often encouraged, as a way of making articles clearer and easier to manage. The reconstruction article is very long, and needs this. Rjensen ( talk) 06:02, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

@ Rjensen: I want to compromise. How about we integrate all the content in this article into Reconstruction Era then create Hatnotes for specific sections that are overly lengthy? I do not disagree with your assertion that the Reconstruction Era article is overly long. If this is okay with you, then I will retract my post on the noticeboard.

However, I want to make it clear that I have never seen reliable sources that treat white southerners as the primary population of concern. That point will remain a point of disagreement between you and I. And I can only accept that statement with reliable sources. Mitchumch ( talk) 09:44, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

Oppose merge Though some of the information overlaps, these seem to be two very different articles. The African American Civil Rights article takes a more detailed and focused view of African-American movements and efforts towards change during this time. It focuses more on African-Americans as agents of change during a historical period, while the Reconstruction article is really more about the efforts of the U.S. government to 'reconstruct' the divided country and all its disparate elements. Other efforts, like the struggles by African-Americans to integrate streetcars and other places in the North could potentially be added to the Civil Rights article. Integrating at least some of the material into the Reconstruction article and creating a hat note to the Civil Rights article, as Mitchumch proposes, would probably be a good compromise. ABF99 ( talk) 15:00, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

Oppose merge I agree with what ABF99 has to say. The proposal does not seem to have been clearly thought out. Mitchumch says, for example, "because scholarly and academic sources DO NOT use this term for this period of American history." Of course, this article isn't about an era -- it's about a movement. You ignore the part of WP:Content forking which states:

There are two situations where spinoff subarticles become necessary, and, when done properly, they create the opportunity to go into much more detail than otherwise permissible:

1. Articles where individual sections create an undue weight problem

2. Large summary style overview meta-articles which are composed of many summary sections

Number 2 obviously applies here. The reconstruction article is already at over 180,000 bytes -- we should be talking about cutting more from that article into subarticles (such as this one) rather than adding more to it. Tom (North Shoreman) ( talk) 17:12, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

@ North Shoreman: When I posted the merger proposal the article looked like this. Rjensen added all the other content today.

As far as cutting, I proposed doing that before ABF99 posted his thoughts. Rjensen wants to segregate this content from the Reconstruction Era because it's about African Americans, not because of a "movement". Please reread his stated motives above.

And there was no "movement". Just Reconstruction Era. Try finding reliable sources for "movement". Mitchumch ( talk) 17:56, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

If all you are proposing now is leaving this article alone (other than normal editing) and including some cross references to it from other articles, then I see no need for this proposed merge. What do you mean there was "no movement"? Are you saying there was no civil rights movement until sometime after 1895? Why should an article about a "movement" (i.e. this article that you proposed to eliminate) have a name that is commonly applied to an era (i.e Reconstruction and Jim Crow Eras)? Tom (North Shoreman) ( talk) 18:09, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

@ North Shoreman: I don't understand your last question.

You claimed "It also violates WP:COMMONNAME, because scholarly and academic sources DO NOT use this term for this period of American history." Why should an article about a MOVEMENT have the common name for a PERIOD OF AMERICAN HISTORY? Where is the violation in this article's name? Tom (North Shoreman) ( talk) 18:32, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

@ North Shoreman: There was no "movement". What reliable sources are telling you there was a "movement"? Mitchumch ( talk) 18:37, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

Have you read the article you are trying to delete? The first sentence: "The African-American Civil Rights Movement (1865–1895) refers to the post-Civil War reform movements in the United States aimed at eliminating racial discrimination against African Americans, improving educational and employment opportunities, and establishing electoral power." There are a number of sourced examples of political, social, economic and religious movements in this article that are adequately sourced. Blacks did not sit passively during this era -- they made the best of a bad situation and their efforts merit an article. I'm not sure there is one common name that describes these multitude of movements -- perhaps most commonly they are described as the roots of the larger civil rights movement that took off in the 1950s. Absent a common name to describe these separate but related movements, we need to create a name for the article that is descriptive and recognizable -- see WP:CRITERIA. You have not proposed any alternative that is commonly used for these movements. They are not called Reconstruction movements or Jim Crow movements -- Reconstruction Era and Jim Crow Era as titles cover time periods and are too broad to be acceptable as titles for this article. Tom (North Shoreman) ( talk) 22:35, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

@ North Shoreman:Yes, I read the article. When I posted the merge notice two days ago the article looked like this. Rjensen added the content you see now. The first sentence you cited from the article lead was written by some editor. That doesn't make it true. That sentence possesses no citation to substantiate the claim it makes.

The scholarly/academic community uses the term " Black Freedom Struggle". This term has emerged to denote the history of struggle for the African American community from colonial era to present time in the United States. It is often used for the Civil Rights Movement, but has become acceptable among academics/scholars to use for other periods of time.

There is not a different term for the Reconstruction Era. Like the Jim Crow Era, Civil Rights Movement, and Black Power Movement the African American community were central to those periods or movements. It would seem odd to create a separate article about African Americans during those other movements or eras due the centrality of the African American experience. I'm not sure why Wikipedia users believe the term "movement" must be in a title to present a political history of the African American community. There is no scholarship to support that. Reliable sources do not support that. It is what it is. Mitchumch ( talk) 10:17, 15 March 2016 (UTC) reply

The first sentence of the article was copied above not for the truthfulness but to show how we define the title -- as a series of movements. Any confusion a reader might have about whether we have attempted to place the start of the Civil Rights Movement from the 1950s into the 1860s should be eliminated by this clarification. If you think more is needed, add something like "These movements are antecedent, but not part of, the civil rights events beginning in the 1950s." Nobody is saying that "movement" must be in the title. What I'm saying is that the title (including the dates of the movement) meets all the criteria of WP:CRITERIA. Since you didn't comment on this, let me add the relevant info:

A good Wikipedia article title has the five following characteristics:

• Recognizability – The title is a name or description of the subject that someone familiar with, although not necessarily an expert in, the subject area will recognize.
• Naturalness – The title is one that readers are likely to look or search for and that editors would naturally use to link to the article from other articles. Such a title usually conveys what the subject is actually called in English.
• Precision – The title unambiguously identifies the article's subject and distinguishes it from other subjects. (See § Precision and disambiguation, below.)
• Conciseness – The title is no longer than necessary to identify the article's subject and distinguish it from other subjects.
• Consistency – The title is consistent with the pattern of similar articles' titles. Many of these patterns are listed (and linked) as topic-specific naming conventions on article titles, in the box above.

But enough about the name. You've proposed a possible alternative, but this discussion is not about the naming -- it's about your wish to eliminate the article entirely. According to your own research, whether we call it a movement or a struggle, there are ample sources to justify an article on the contents of this existing article. My suggestion -- drop the merge template, write the Jim Crow Era article, and propose a name change for this article if you want (although you seem to recognize that consensus will likely against you). Tom (North Shoreman) ( talk) 16:32, 15 March 2016 (UTC) reply

@ North Shoreman: I have a question. Would it make sense to you to have these two articles on Wikipedia - " Civil Rights Movement" and "Civil Rights Movement and African Americans"? Mitchumch ( talk) 17:14, 15 March 2016 (UTC) reply

Not really. Assuming you're talking about the post 1954 article, African Americans were the most significant participants and, more significantly, the main beneficiaries. As I've said elsewhere, I don't see what existing problem for readers is going to be solved by anything we're discussing. Tom (North Shoreman) ( talk) 00:03, 16 March 2016 (UTC) reply

What topics are typically covered in Reconstruction? I think Mitchumch has an incorrect view. Here's the outline of a major university textbook (American Pageant by Kennedy et al. 15th ed 2014) Lots of attention to topics such as Congress & the President besides the African-American Civil Rights Movement. Rjensen ( talk) 17:39, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

@ Rjensen: I never said other topics weren't covered. What is your response to my compromise proposal? Mitchumch ( talk) 17:56, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

A better plan is to shorten the Reconstruction article by moving some details here and leaving a summary there. Rjensen ( talk) 18:01, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

@ Rjensen: Numerous sections in the Reconstruction article require hatnotes, not solely about African Americans. Mitchumch ( talk) 18:07, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

Agreed. hatnotes are useful: they tell readers there is a fuller discussion available at another article, and allow the Reconstruction article to be shortened. Rjensen ( talk) 18:19, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

@ Rjensen: Okay. I see some pre-existing articles for some sections. Other sections, like Lincoln's, Johnson's, and Grant's presidential Reconstruction may be tied into their articles on their presidency. Unless you think they require new articles. The remainders seem to require the creation of new articles. Is this what you see? Mitchumch ( talk) 18:33, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

@ Rjensen: What is the purpose of the "Overview" and "Purpose" sections? They appear to serve the same purpose as the lead. Can we merge those sections with the lead paragraphs? Mitchumch ( talk) 19:35, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

The Reconstruction era is the product of 6900 edits by hundreds of interested editors (in all 3000 different editors) over 14 years. I suggest it is practically impossible to make radical changes in it without very extensive discussions. Those discussions of course belong on the talk page of the Reconstruction article, not here. (However I will note that the lead on the Reconstruction article is already near the maximum length.) Rjensen ( talk) 23:10, 14 March 2016 (UTC) reply

Oppose merge. Some looking around suggests that User:Mitchumch is a productive and constructive editor. Seems to me that Mitchumch's core objection is that the phrase "African-American Civil Rights Movement" does not appear in academia per se. And so any article with that name is not a valid article topic. And so this material must be merged out into other articles which have academically valid topics. And this train of thought developed into a proposed five-way merge that would eliminate this page and its offending name and scope, and merge a great deal of other material into a single super-article. Mitchumch, correct me if I'm wrong. But in wikipedia scope derives from editorial consensus, not from RS. I see the name and scope of this article as entirely clear, reasonable, reasonably specific, and without any inherent POV twist. And so I don't see the root problem. Granted these five articles have overlaps and other issues but this proposed five-way pileup is not the best answer. With good humor Lockley ( talk) 00:18, 15 March 2016 (UTC) reply

@ Lockley: Thank you. You partly understand the reason I have proposed the mergers. Three of those articles don't use "Civil Rights Movement" in their title. My objective to improve the Jim Crow article was the core reason I added Template:Merge to five articles. The remaining content should go to the articles Reconstruction Era or Civil Rights Movement.

The term "Civil Rights Movement" denotes a specific event. For example, the American Revolution is a specific event. To create three articles American Revolution (1775-1788), American Revolution (1789-1865), and American Revolution (1866-1968) would violate WP:ORIGINALRESEARCH and WP:COMMONNAME. The Wikipedia process of editorial consensus does NOT make those article titles valid nor the scope of those articles valid. I'm not sure why this has occurred with the term Civil Rights Movement on Wikipedia, but it's the same scenario. Editors are ignoring WP:Reliable Sources.

WP:Scope states, "scope of an article is the range of material that belongs in the article, and thus also determines what does not belong in it" That is not the same as WP:Article titles. That states, "Wikipedia generally prefers the name that is most commonly used (as determined by its prevalence in a significant majority of independent, reliable English-language sources) as such names will usually best fit the criteria ... The "Civil Rights Movement" term, like "American Revolution", is not a generic term like "Political history of African Americans in the United States" or "Reconstruction Era and African Americans".

The root problem seems embedded in the idea that editors think the term "Civil Rights Movement" is a generic term. Perhaps you can help me with this, because I don't understand this line of reasoning. Nor have I seen reliable sources to support that claim. What sources are you using to arrive at this conclusion? Mitchumch ( talk) 11:22, 15 March 2016 (UTC) reply

• Oppose merge - Despite some overlap this is a discrete and notable topic, not a fork. Carrite ( talk) 05:53, 15 March 2016 (UTC) reply
• Oppose merge - While this article can be improved, it is a place to focus on what African Americans did for themselves in this period; as NorthShoreman noted, there were many movements and work going on to build political power, etc., including separate religious institutions, newspapers (Alex Manly's in Wilmington, NC). Having this represented only in "Reconstruction era" article, which often addresses struggles at state and national levels, or a "Jim Crow era," is likely to have content dominated by what whites did to blacks. Blacks were not only reacting to whites but positively and separately building their own communities and lives, with progress at local levels accumulating across the South. Parkwells ( talk) 16:12, 24 March 2016 (UTC) reply

the phrase "African-American Civil Rights Movement" appears in over 2000 scholarly articles & books according to google-scholar--including 166 articles in 2015-16. Rjensen ( talk) 07:26, 15 March 2016 (UTC) reply

@ Rjensen: The term "African-American Civil Rights Movement" is NOT used for the Reconstruction Era. I am not questioning the existence of the term among the scholarly/academic community. It is used for the Civil Rights Movement of the 20th century. The following terms, from most used to least used, are used to denote the movement in the 20th century based on Google N-gram. Due to the ebb and flow in prevalence of use over time, their current rankings do not match total hit counts. The following is only from Google Books:

Civil Rights movement - 293,000 hits

American civil rights movement - 49,300 hits

Second Reconstruction - 36,700 hits

Civil Rights Revolution - 42,100 hits

Modern Civil Rights Movement - 17,200 hits

Black Freedom Movement - 17,800 hits

Black Freedom Struggle - 25,600 hits (This term is different from the others. This term has emerged within the scholarly community to denote the history of struggle for the African American community from colonial era to present time in the United States.)

Black civil rights movement - 22,000 hits

U.S. Civil Rights Movement - 13,700 hits

1960s Civil Rights Movement - 8,060 hits

Negro Revolution - 19,100 hits

African American civil rights movement - 15,400 hits

Southern Freedom Movement - 2,020 hits

Black rights movement - 3,640 hits

United States civil rights movement - 1,980 hits

Negro Freedom Movement - 2,230 hits

Classic civil rights movement - 224 hits

Classical civil rights movement - 84 hits

The term "African American civil rights movement" is nearer the bottom of the list for the Civil Rights Movement - the very movement people associate for that term. Mitchumch ( talk) 08:31, 15 March 2016 (UTC) reply

The term is used for Reconstruction--you should read more books and articles: 1) start with Zhang, The Origins of the African American Civil Rights Movement, 1865‐1956 (2002) which begins in 1865. 2) Or look here for Reconstruction; 3) then try Capek (2014). Civil Rights Movement. p. 17. 4) for a sophsticated historiography read a page from Bruce E. Baker (2007). What Reconstruction Meant: Historical Memory in the American South. p. 145.. Rjensen ( talk) 08:59, 15 March 2016 (UTC) reply

@ Rjensen: Where do they call "Reconstruction" the "African American civil rights movement"? Correct me if I'm wrong, but those works discuss the Reconstruction Era as an antecedent to the Civil Rights Movement of the 20th century.

Reconstruction is indeed a separate & larger topic--so we need separate articles. Rjensen ( talk) 17:17, 15 March 2016 (UTC) reply

I know there is a discussion within the community regarding the dating of the Civil Rights Movement. See the pivotal article by Hall, Jacquelyn Dowd (March 2005). "The Long Civil Rights Movement and the Political Uses of the Past" (PDF). Journal of American History. 91: 1233–1263. An article online briefly discusses the impact of the article Greene, Robert, II (February 2, 2014). "The Long Civil Rights Movement and Intellectual History". Society for U.S. Intellectual History. Retrieved 15 March 2016.{{ cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list ( link) Most discussions place the earliest time around the New Deal era. As an example, see essay by Sullivan, Patricia (1991). "Southern Reformers, the New Deal and the Movement's Foundation". In Robinson, Armstead L.; Sullivan, Patricia (eds.). New Directions in Civil Rights Studies. University of Virginia Press. pp. 81–104. ISBN  9780813913193. {{ cite book}}: External link in |chapterurl= ( help); Unknown parameter |chapterurl= ignored (|chapter-url= suggested) ( help).

There are numerous civil rights oriented museums around the country it's interesting to see how they handle this issue: "resistance to slavery, Reconstruction-era politics, and the reign of Jim Crow are variously cited as antecedents of movement and are depicted in considerable detail." [Renee Christine Romano, ‎Leigh Raiford - The Civil Rights Movement in American Memory (2006) - Page 17] Rjensen ( talk) 17:49, 15 March 2016 (UTC) reply

@ Rjensen: I read parts of that book last year. A very thought provoking read. Another work related to memory I have yet to read is Lavelle, Kristen M. (2015). Whitewashing the South: White Memories of Segregation and Civil Rights. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN  9781442239258. The work you mentioned bolsters the need for an over arching article about the "Black Freedom Struggle". Mitchumch ( talk) 18:58, 15 March 2016 (UTC) reply

• Oppose Merge - if this proposal was made because the article lacked content, the proposal is obsolete since that problem clearly no longer exists. The notion that there shouldn't be an article on the civil rights movement during this period - because content overlaps with articles describing the period generally - is spurious. By that logic we could fit half of the encyclopedia into a number of articles titled 12th Century, 13th Century, 14th Century, etc. The Civil Rights movement was a real phenomenon during Reconstruction even if the name has been applied retrospectively. - Darouet ( talk) 21:31, 29 March 2016 (UTC) reply