Talk:Caledonia Township, Illinois

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On 26 November 2022, it was proposed that this article be moved from Caledonia Township, Illinois to Caledonia Township, Boone County, Illinois. The result of the discussion was moved.

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Requested move 26 November 2022

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: moved. (closed by non-admin page mover) — Mdaniels5757 (talk • contribs) 15:17, 11 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Caledonia Township, Illinois → Caledonia Township, Boone County, Illinois – This move would restore the county name to be WP:CONSISTENT with the form used for articles about townships in Illinois (see Category:Townships in Illinois). The county was removed without discussion in February 2020, but per the US minor civil divisions guidance "any change in convention should be determined on a statewide basis". I'm not currently aware of any reason why this township should be titled differently than others in the state. (Original request.) ╠╣uw [talk] 13:01, 26 November 2022 (UTC)— Relisting. —usernamekiran (talk) 17:11, 3 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Note: I made two similar moves recently that relate to this: Annawan Township, Henry County, Illinois, which had been moved without discussion in 2021 to just "Annawan Township" (no county or state), and Pontiac Township, Livingston County, Illinois. ╠╣uw [talk] 13:16, 26 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - @Huwmanbeing: please could I enquire what the fundamental rationale is for the townships being named this way? I get that there's a consistency argument, but really it's not Caledonia Township that is out of line here, it's all the other entries at Category:Townships in Illinois, and indeed townships in other states. These pages are fundamentally misaligned with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines, in particular WP:CONCISE, which advises to make the titles only as long as they need to be to identify the topic and WP:USPLACE, which says: "articles on populated places in the United States are typically titled "Placename, State" when located within a state or "Placename, Territory" in US territories. A placename that needs additional disambiguation should include its county or parish" (emphasis mine). Caledonia Township is certainly a populated place, and it equally does not need additional disambiguation beyond the state name, and nor do the vast majority of entries at the category. So unless you have a reason I haven't thought of for why the county is needed, it's the other entries (other than those that are duplicates, such as Ash Grove Township, Iroquois County, Illinois and Ash Grove Township, Shelby County, Illinois that we should be moving. Then your desired consistency will be achieved, and the aforementioned policies will be honoured. Cheers — Amakuru (talk) 16:18, 26 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Sure thing, though I should note that Illinois township article titles are already almost completely consistent. The only current outlier is this one (and potentially the two I already moved, as noted), so determining if there's any compelling reason for Caledonia to use a different form than all of its peers is the focus here.

That said, if you think the titles of all articles on townships should follow a different form than they currently do, that's perfectly fine — but per the instructions at WP:PLACE that's something that should be handled at the state level for greater visibility and consensus. If that's something you think should be debated then I recommend going ahead and opening an RFC at WikiProject Illinois on this, or I can if you prefer.

Briefly: though I'm not equally familiar with every state, I know that for Midwestern ones like Illinois the county name has long been retained in part because townships are very closely identified with the counties they subdivide and are most naturally titled as such (just as we always include the state even for uniquely-named counties). For example, see reliable sources like the US Census, ACS Census Reporter, etc.

It's also partly that township names are unusually repetitive, more so than other placenames, and as such many would require the county to be included even under minimal disambiguation. (Ash Grove is not the only such township in Illinois with a duplicated name: there's also Auburn, Banner, Bear Creek, Benton, Blue Mound, Brooklyn, Browning, Burton, Cincinnati, Clayton, Concord, Douglas, East Fork, Essex, Florence, Foster, Fox, Frankfort, Freedom, Grant, Greene, Greenwood, Groveland, Hanover, Harlem, Honey Creek, Jackson, Johnson, Kansas, Lafayette, Lee, Liberty, Limestone, Lynn, Maine, Manlius, Marion, Martin, May, Melrose, Montgomery, Mound, New Salem, Orange, Otter Creek, Penn, Pilot, Prairie, Raymond, Richland, Riverside, Ross, Rural, Rutland, Salem, Saratoga, Scott, Seward, Sullivan, Sumner, Union, Wade, Walnut Grove, Warren, Washington, West, Westfield, Wheatland, Woodland, Worth, and York, all of which appear at least twice and sometimes three or even four times over. Since many titles would still need the county name even under minimal disambiguation, applying it to all helps produce a set that's predictable and in a single form.) ╠╣uw [talk] 18:20, 26 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

BTW just for reference, the only recent RM I know of to seek to remove the county from a township title in any state was this one last month in Ohio, for which there was no consensus. ╠╣uw [talk] 18:34, 26 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

~~Oppose~~ per Amakuru, WP:ATDAB says ambiguity can result in inconsistency like Chicken v Turkey (bird) and I can't fine another. Crouch, Swale (talk) 21:15, 26 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Would you say there's anything about the township itself that justifies titling it differently than all others in the category? If the concern is with the statewide convention, and not specifically with this article, then it sounds like it'd be good to address this at the state WikiProject (as the guideline recommends). ╠╣uw [talk] 21:55, 26 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

OK, striking per that guidance, I'm not sure if disambiguation is needed but if the guidence says it is generally used that that's probably fine. Crouch, Swale (talk) 22:01, 26 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Note: WikiProject Illinois has been notified of this discussion. —usernamekiran (talk) 17:11, 3 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Support per WP:PLACE#Minor civil divisions. This is the convention currently used in Illinois.

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.