Talk:Charles Edward Magoon

Peer review

This article has much merit, a good eye for detail and a great use of sources. Though I believe there are some prose problems. A few examples.

• he literally wrote the book on the governance of United States's new territories following the Spanish-American War Needs clarification - what book and how did he literally write it

• In 1906, Cuba was in the process of being re-controlled by the United States after the democratically elected President Tomás Estrada Palma attempted to remain in power after the conclusion of his term, which resulted in a revolt and caused the US military to step in again. long sentence, two "afters", and I'm not sure about "in the process of being re-controlled by the United States". That could do with a re-word.

Regarding Cuba, though Magoon made some fairly conservative but necessary changes, he was hated by the Cuban elite, Cuban writers were consistently disparaging, one calling him a "buzzard devouring the treasury of Cuba". So I think this needs to be added. I may be able to help with a few details, particuarly the Cuba section which is good, but could do with a bit more colour.

I recommend to re-read the article outloud and try to improve the flow and syntax. Otherwise a great base, and with some steady tweaking should reach good article status without too much strain. --Zleitzen 00:51, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

If you have good sources on the Cuban opinion of him, can you point me at some? Most of my sources have an unabashedly pro-US bias, as is typical of any American media attention he received at the time. I've tried to stick to facts and quotes, to get around the bias, but you know how American colonialism is... JRP 01:01, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Hi JRP. I do as it happens, and will add them when I have a moment. For some reason he really pissed Cubans off, though there is little evidence that he did anything corrupt or damaging.--Zleitzen 01:05, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

I've made some major textual changes, including cleaning up the two areas which you cited. How does it look to you now? JRP 06:34, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Great work Jrp. I should get round to adding some sources and info myself in the near future.--Zleitzen 07:10, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

GA on hold

• A few references have a space between the full-stop, [6], [18], [17] and a few more.
• Please break the lead into two paragraphs
• However, he left, remove 'however'
• Congress was hotly debating , remove 'hotly'
• 200km, needs a space to be 200 km
• , for example, remove that
• Many in Cuba and the United States were concerned, who are 'many' please clear that up
• Some sentences are too long and need a full-stop rather then a comma
• Brackets shouldn't be used to explain something.

Take these examples

According to then-Secretary (later President), He was a secretary so no need to mention 'then' and no need to mention he was later a president

of all members of the Canal Commission (including Walker) and, change to of all members of the Canal Commission, including Walker and....

(These were codified as a published book in 1902, then considered the seminal work on the subject.) no need for brackets here

It's kind of hard to explain but most/all of the brackets have got to go. Also shorten sentences, some are too long. These issues are minor so it will be put on hold. Good-luck M3tal H3ad 04:25, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

I've made many changes to follow your suggestions. Many of the bracketed items have been just deleted, some have been merged into the text better. I also clarified and reworded against the weasel-word "many" that you pointed out, though in this case it was Magoon himself who used the word "many". I've shortened some sentences that had long clauses with commas, but this is tricky so I hope I did that to your satisfaction. And finally, I reworked the intro somewhat. (Plus, the easy cosmetic changes you suggested.) Is this better? JRP 05:08, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

• Note [22] has a space
• building 200 km of highways, reword that
• Following these hearings, though not necessarily related,, remove all that
• During this whole period, remove that
• It was significant also that , remove 'also'
• Try remove words like however, despite, though etc. M3tal H3ad 08:54, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your additional suggestions. I've fixed a number of these issues, but to be honest the text does not always read better to me as I remove those linking words and I've had to restructure some sentences to ensure I convey the same meaning. Possibly, this is the point, but I don't have an ear for these improvements. Maybe I should find a good reference on line editing. I'm not sure what you want me to do with the highways line. I don't want to remove that he built them and removing specific data on how many highways he built seems a subtraction. What do you think? JRP 15:44, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Promoted to GA, my suggestion is to get peer review(general one) and have it assessed by wikiproject biography to see if it is worthy of A-class. Good job. M3tal H3ad 05:48, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

Early life

Two things: What is a "prep" program? What "prominent law firm"? --Milkbreath 16:18, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

Recommended Source

If I may make a suggestion, Charles E. Chapman's A History of the Cuban Republic (1927) has a worthwhile treatment of Magoon's administration. He cites the hostile Cuban sources candidly, but also gives what I believe is a well-supported defense of Magoon, particularly against the charge that he recklessly exhausted the Cuban treasury. Specifically, in this instance, Chapman argues that every bit of the cash on hand in the treasury was already "encumbered," in accounting terms, i.e. it was either owed to someone and should have been paid, or it had in fact already been appropriated by the Cuban Congress under Estrada Palma for some very necessary purposes, such as road building, bridge building, relief from hurricane damage, etc. Without this side of the picture being presented more fully, the article as it stands is, IMO, actually biased against Magoon.

Terry J. Carter (talk) 17:41, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

Assessment comment

The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Charles Edward Magoon/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.

Reached FA class January 2007.-- Zleitzen(talk) 21:29, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Last edited at 21:29, 25 February 2007 (UTC). Substituted at 11:17, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

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FA in need of review

This article was promoted in 2007 and has never been reviewed since. I have doubts if the article represents "a thorough and representative survey of the relevant literature" on the subject, since practically every source used in the article is a contemporary news piece. There's no lack of scholarly literature out there that relates to Magoon and none of it is currently on the article:

• Lockmiller, David (1969). Magoon in Cuba: A History of the Second Intervention, 1906–1909.
• Mellander, Gustavo A.; Nelly Maldonado Mellander (1999). Charles Edward Magoon: The Panama Years.
• Mellander, Gustavo A. (1971). The United States in Panamanian Politics: The Intriguing Formative Years.
• Millet, Allan Reed. (1968). The politics of intervention: the military occupation of Cuba, 1906-1909. - (I needed 2 minutes on Google Scholar to find a fully-available-326-pages pdf of this via Ohio State University. There are 405 matches to Magoon on this book alone);
• Díaz-Briquets, S; Pérez-López, J. (2006). Corruption in Cuba: Castro and beyond. - Seak-peek;
• Hernández, JM. (2010). Cuba and the United States: Intervention and Militarism, 1868-1933.
• Suchlicki, J. (2002). Cuba: from Columbus to Castro and beyond - Sneak-peek;

These are just examples; I'm not that knowledgeable about US interventions, US diplomacy, Cuba or Panama, but these seem significant omissions in an FA. At the moment, the article fails criteria 1. c) of FAs. RetiredDuke (talk) 17:22, 5 December 2020 (UTC)