Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2020 November 17

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November 17

5 year trial delay for train attack

The suspects in the 2015 Thalys train attack have just gone on trial 5 years later.[1] I did a double take when I saw the news article because that incident was far enough in the past that I thought the legal aspects would have been long since wound down by now. Why such a long delay? Was there anything terribly complicated about it? Do the suspects have platoons of white shoe lawyers filing motions all day long to delay things like Exxon might have after a big oil spill? It didn't really seem like that kind of operation. Thanks. 2601:648:8202:96B0:25EB:282F:5576:C543 (talk) 05:35, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

Pending the response of someone with real knowledge of the trial and surrounding legal matters, I would observe that the train journey in question traversed three separate countries, and the perpetrator, victims and other active participants in the event (let alone any passive witnesses who might be called, and also the train's owners) span at least half-a-dozen different nationalities, all of whose legal authorities (plus those of the EU itself) might have interests and demands relating to the case, with some of them making their own preliminary investigations. The co-ordination of all these individuals, authorities and organisations is likely not a trivial undertaking. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.197.26.5 (talk) 08:33, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

In a jury trial (which this is), the prosecution wants to avoid any possibility that the defense can spring a surprise and introduce previously unknown exculpatory evidence. This means they will strive to obtain testimony from all people who may have witnessed parts of the events as they unfolded – that is, in this case, basically all train passengers.  --Lambiam 11:36, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

for the first claim. Neither the English or the French source used in our article (and the English source in our article is the same as above) says anything about a jury that I saw, and I couldn't find any suggestion there is one. (From what I can tell, jury is jury in french too. Juror is jurée or juré depending on gender.) Our article Cour d'assises mentions that terrorism charges are generally tried before a special Cour d'assises which only has panel of judges, and the source claims one of the charges is attempted terrorism murder. Various French sources like [2] [3] support the notion it's before a "Cour d'assises spéciale". (There are some English sources, but these look like crappy machine translated likely copyvios from French sources.)

There are even some sources like [4] which mention stuff like "composée de magistrats professionnels et non d'un jury populaire. Le verdict devrait être rendu le 18 décembre." (I.E. the French sources I did find which mentioned a jury seemed to suggest there was none.)

Note that France has an Inquisitorial system and so (other) judges can be involved in investigating cases. This is mostly for serious cases, but this seems to be one, and I found sources suggesting that did happen for this case e.g. [5] [6]. (Those sources suggest that the inquisitorial part may have taken at least a year, since there's one from late 2016, and another from 2018 which mentions something which happened in November last year i.e. 2018.)

Various sources like [7] [8] suggest France has come under criticism from the ECHR for their lengthy delays, although the first sources suggests a more normal delay is 18 months for the trial to start. Given the effect the COVID-19 pandemic has had, you can maybe treat this trial like it happened in April which admittedly doesn't help that much.

Nil Einne (talk) 13:01, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

The title "Lawyer Says Film '15:17 To Paris' Would Prejudice Train Attack Jury" of this news item put me on the wrong foot. I had seen a news report that the prosecution intended to have Clint Eastwood heard as a witness and assumed, without checking, that El-Khazzani's lawyer's objection was related to this. It remains likely, though, that during the investigation the prosecution, just like the defence, did not know that the trial would eventually be held without a jury, and therefore sought to cover all potential holes.  --Lambiam 12:37, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

Criminal cases are trivial to delay, even low-profile ones. In the United States, I've seen cases get continued a half dozen times without any objection, at the request of the accused's lawyers. In fact, today it's almost always the accused's lawyers or legal situation slowing things down nowadays. Five years may seem like a lot, but this being a high-profile terrorism case on an international conveyance, my expectation were it to have happened in the United States is that the lawyers for the accused would be throwing many, many procedural roadblocks in the way of a trial and at each individual charge. As to the French legal system, I'm not as sure, but I wouldn't be surprised if the same sorts of procedural wrangling (perhaps with a more continental flavor) would be routine. 199.66.69.13 (talk) 13:51, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

Media calling the US election results

(Yet another US election question): watching the US election from the other side of the Pond, one thing that seemed rather odd to me was that apparently it is down to the media to "call" the results is each state (with UK media such as the BBC and Guardian waiting on US media to get the results, and sometimes reporting differently if they were getting it from different sources). The Guardian "explained" that this was because elections are run by the states, and there isn't a single Federal organisation in charge. But that doesn't explain why they don't get the results from an official State source. What is the reason for this? Iapetus (talk) 10:32, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

"Calling" a state is just a prediction. The official determination comes from the states. --Khajidha (talk) 10:45, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

If you live in a country where officials are chosen by a popular election, you will probably see that the TV channels call the winner before the official determination. For example, Sky News proclaimed Sadiq Khan the winner of the 2016 London mayoral election on Friday 6 May 2016 18:34, local time.^[9] The official determination was announced on Saturday 7 May 00:30, almost six hours later. In the US, each state can set its own rules for how and when the vote counts become official; the only hard deadline is that the state's set of electors must be fixed on Monday, December 14, when they cast their votes. Ballotpedia has a list of how and when election results are finalized in each state. California takes its time, setting December 11 as the date. Somewhat understandably, the media do not wait that long.  --Lambiam 12:20, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

It isn't "down to the media" to call results. What the media does is report true things (or at least do the best to report those things to the highest accuracy possible). For example, if a candidate is ahead in a race by more votes than have not yet been counted, then it is not mathematically possible for that candidate to lose, so the state has been won, even if the vote count isn't finished. When a media organization "calls" a race, it means that they, to the best of their ability, have noticed that math is a thing, and said "wow, look at this math thing that happened. Well, I guess because math is real, this election, even though there are some votes left to be counted, is really over regardless". That's what the media does. Sometimes, candidates and their supporters, who don't believe math is a thing, refuse to accept this. That's all that is happening here. --Jayron32 12:34, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

This is complicated by mail-in votes and early voting, as these totals may be tracked separately and counting may not have even been started on election day. In many states, mail in ballots could not (by law) be counted until the day after election day. Media sources may not have any clue how many such ballots were sent out, let alone how many were returned. And, depending on the state, mail in ballots may be allowed to be counted even if they arrive after the official election day, as long as they were sent by election day and received within a designated time. Where I live (NC), ballots received by the 12th were valid, as long as they were postmarked by the 3rd. --Khajidha (talk) 13:12, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

Yes, this is all true, but the OP asked why the media was treated as some sort of official sanctioning body for the elections. It isn't. The media merely reports on what has already happened, so when the media says something like "California is being projected for Joe Biden", what they mean is "Even though the counting isn't done, it isn't mathematically possible for Donald Trump to win California". Even though the official counting may not be certified by the State of California for several days afterwards, they may "call" a state before that time when it becomes certain that a candidate has won said state. This is not "official" in any sense, but that isn't what matters. In all elections in all countries, the media will report likely winners before the official election results are in; as noted this is normal practice in the UK, where the media will state who won an election earlier than the official announcement. --Jayron32 13:25, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

Also, different news sources make their own individual "calls". Using "the media" as a singular mass noun tends to obscure that fact. --174.95.161.129 (talk) 21:33, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

To be fair, only two major bodies exist to provide projections: the National Election Pool (an independent meta-conglomerate consortium of three of our major news-media conglomerates operated by a third-party company), and the Associated Press (a different, independent special-purpose organization of the meta-conglomerate wire service operated by a third-party university group). If you received election-week updates from any television channel or internet-website-not-ending-in-.gov (on any portion of the political-spectrum), you were almost certainly receiving information originally sourced from these two special-purpose conglomerates, whose aggregate sourcing, projections-from-government-officials, and other methods, are all described on their own respective websites, NEP and AP.

Though a handful of other micro-outlets may use other projection methodologies, those outlets are so non-noteworthy that it's fair to call them "cranks."

Nimur (talk) 19:30, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

Nimur, are you sure? While several of the major news organizations pool their exit polls through the NEP, don't they make their calls (projections based on exit polls and initial returns) independently of one another? See the NTY's Network Race Call Tracker, where they separately track the calls from ABC News, CBS News, NBC News, CNN, Fox News, Decision Desk HQ, Associated Press, Reuters, & the New York Times. During coverage in the days immediately following the election, Nate Silver specifically spoke of the ABC Decision Desk in ways which implied its independence from other agency's desks. And this article on the calling of Arizona for Mr. Biden also speaks of the various agencies as having independent decision desks, even if there was grouping in the timing of the calls. -- ToE 22:29, 22 November 2020 (UTC)

(EC) I think two things which confuses a lot of people outside the US may be the way preliminary results are handled along with a continuous and slow (for some places) count of results. In a lot of states it seems to be a confusing mess with a lack of an official tally for that state. Nil Einne (talk) 13:41, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

To give a specific example, see Talk:2020 United States presidential election#Note: Arizona has been called. Why was the Secretary of State just randomly reporting somewhere that they counted all votes? Why wasn't there some website you could go to see the official preliminary results with a 100% count? I'm sure it makes sense to Americans or at least Arizonans, but I think for many of us outside the US, not so much..... Note that this specific example illustrates why such an approach can lead to confusion. I had a look, but never figured out where the Secretary of State had made said report, was it a tweet, a press conference or what? Nor did I figure out what those 100% count results were. Relying on the media didn't work either. IIRC, even 4 hours after this supposedly happened, many of the media didn't seem to know. I think by that time because the overall election had already been won by Biden and it was also several days after and very early morning, a lot of the media didn't have major people working so it took a long while for this news to filter through. Nil Einne (talk) 14:13, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

Comparing with NZ to explain why the US seems to confusing Nil Einne (talk) 14:06, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

By way of comparison, NZ had an election a few weeks before the US. Preliminary results of the 2020 New Zealand general election were published as they came in on an official government website with all such results completed in I think ~8 hours of the voting finishing except for the two referenda. (These did take a while although the date for their preliminary results was advertised well in advance.) The media could also collect results themselves if they wanted to but the official preliminary results meant you didn't have to rely on them. The preliminary results included the projected winners for each seat, along with projections of numbers of list seats. The preliminary results included ordinary votes and advance (ordinary) votes, but not any special votes. Special votes included all postal votes (as NZ appeared to have COVID-19 under control, there was far less concern about voting in person although more people did advance vote in part to avoid crowds since we didn't have hour long queues), people voting from outside their electorate (even advanced votes) and some other cases like people voting from prison or hospital. [10] After the preliminary results were published, there was no further update of results until the final results. (To be fair, as I mentioned a few weeks ago, this does require some degree of trust especially with a reasonable number of uncounted votes. If you someone is leading by 2% and starts losing with the final results because there were a large number of uncounted votes, this could generate suspicion. A slow and steady count results over time makes it easier to see what was happening.) This time around, there was only limited interest in what could change with the final results, since the results on nearly all fronts, even electorates, were clear enough. (Although that obviously relied on media etc projections.) There were some minor unknowns e.g. will the Māori Party manage to bring another list MP, but mostly it was clear there wasn't going to be any major changes. (Notably for the two referenda, which were intended to be semi-binding, the one to legalise cannabis was close but still far enough that it was clear it wasn't going to change. The one to legalise euthanasia was so clear you didn't really need the media.) The lack of interest isn't always the case. Notably in 1999, the Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand were out of parliament based on provisional results [11], but ended up both gaining an electorate seat and passing the 5% threshold. And other coalition possibilities were uncertain without final results. As postal or other special votes increase, there is a risk of greater uncertainty between preliminary and final results. This time around it was about 17% [12]. I could imagine some change if postal votes continue to increase. Note that NZ local elections (see e.g. 2019 New Zealand local elections) have been all postal for a while (check the archives, I published a researched date before), but preliminary results are published on polling day. Even the health boards which use Single Transferable Vote are I think at most a day late. Although this does rely on computerised counting and I think all use a commercial company so may not be an option for some places. (There's also no signature checking or anything like that.) Nil Einne (talk) 14:00, 17 November 2020 (UTC)|} Yes, but in New Zealand, are they allowed to open the envelopes and start counting votes before election day? In many U.S. states this year that had newly-expanded mail-in-ballot systems, the law is written so that mail in vote counting is not allowed to begin (that is, officials cannot even begin counting votes) until election day itself. That is why it takes some time to count them. Someone has to physically open millions of envelopes and count the ballots. That takes time, and the results of that process, in a state where the election is closely divided, may not be mathematically certain for quite some days. --Jayron32 14:08, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

"NZ had an election a few weeks before the US." In a sense, the US didn't have an election. The 50 states and DC each had elections that were coordinated. Many questions of "why the US does this" or "why doesn't the US do this" really miss the point. --Khajidha (talk) 15:29, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

Broadly speaking, this is kind of tying up over a bit of legal-ese fine print. The laws everywhere in the United States require local officials to legally certify the election. In many places, the local official is permitted some amount of time to check their paperwork prior to putting any official's signature on paper.

As our system of government delegates this process to state and county (local) officials, the number of days allowed to fill in that paperwork can vary from place to place.

The proverbial "race" to call an election is because the private-sector is tallying up all the things that have already finished being formally certified, and when possible, assuring that any as-yet-uncertified result could not plausibly change the result.

One reason that various media outlets differ in their "call" is that they retain editorial control over the definition of what is "plausible" in the as-yet-unofficial results. This level of uncertainty can vary between "mathematically impossible" to "astronomically unlikely" to "likelihood of an editorial embarrassment in a few days."

If you are really interested in the microdetails for one particular example: one of our American news outlets - the PBS News Hour - has been regularly airing the details of the official in the state of Georgia. He has tried, while maintaining the decorum of a licensed attorney, to explain the basic facts of addition to a frequently hostile and often confused press.

As a mathematically-inclined engineer, I think I would summarize it in this manner: the method that lawyers use to ascertain truth is very very different than the method used by scientists and engineers and mathematicians. In the end, the truth can't be changed - but we can have totally different ways of ascertaining it. For the lawyers, it is very important to have the right forms filed, to have the signatures in the right place, and triplicate-copies of paperwork with chains-of-evidentiary-custody, and compliance with the extremum-interpretations of the legal mandates.

A concrete example: the votes have all been counted. One part of the law in the state of Georgia (O.C.G.A. § 21-2-384) provides a legal requirement with the phrase "as soon as possible." Another part of the law (O.C.G.A. § 21-2-386) provides a legal requirement with the phrase "As soon as practicable after 7:00 A.M. on the day of the ...election." Another part of the law (O.C.G.A. § 21-2-498) explains how the State will conduct audits (pre-certification) so that they know the answer before the local official signs the form with that particular legal-ese, and that these "risk-limiting audits" must occur "as soon as possible", ... and so on, and so on. I mean, yesterday alone, (November 17, 2020), the (deputy of the office of the...) Secretary of State of Georgia spent over an hour explaining this over, and over, and over again, to the unwashed masses, trying to explain over, and over, and over, how this shall not, cannot, mathematically provably will not change the outcome - but that legally the process has not completed until everyone "gets their stuff done." (Those were his exact words). And how long do they all have to "get their stuff done?" Well, ... they have to do it "as soon as practical...", so that (O.C.G.A. § 21-2-499) "the Governor shall certify the slates of presidential electors no later than 5:00 P.M. on the eighteenth day following the date on which such election was conducted...." except that "such times may be altered for just cause by an order of a judge of superior court of this state." So, ... what deadline do they exactly need to meet, legally, even though everyone already knows the mathematical factual outcome?

The officials actually "can't" say that the result is certified (at the time of this writing), because they are lawyers, and public officials, and the paperwork isn't finished yet. And if you watch in gory detail, he also explains that there will be a mandatory recount, and that also shall not, cannot, mathematically provably will not change the outcome, but that legally it must be done because it is required in the State of Georgia.

At what point in the development of modern society did we all decide to put lawyers in charge? I think it was the exact moment when a majority of the society determined that allowing idiots to fight their stupid battles in suits was preferable to allowing idiots to fight their stupid battles with gun-battles....

Nimur (talk) 18:35, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

So it really is true that politics is a continuation of war by other means... --Jayron32 13:55, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

"The New Way" Series, Liberal pamphlets

I have recently come into possession of a copy of Muir, Ramsay (1923). The New Liberalism. "The New Way" Series. Vol. 1. London: The Daily News Ltd.. From the back cover I see that further volumes included:

• 2 Layton, W. T. The Budget of 1933.
• 3 Brand, R. H. Why I am not a Socialist.
• 4 Simon, E. D. Houses for All.
• 5 Clay, Henry. Property and Inheritance.
• 6 Robertson, D. H. The Ebb and Flow of Unemployment.

and I know that No. 7 was Insurance for All and Everything by William Beveridge.

The pamphlets were based on papers read at the Liberal Summer Schools. According to Starr, Joseph R. (August 1937). "Foreign Governments and Politics: The Summer Schools and Other Educational Activities of the British Liberal Party". The American Political Science Review. 31 (4). American Political Science Association: 703–719. doi:10.2307/1948108. JSTOR 1948108. fifteen pamphlets were issued in the four years from 1923. (While Layton's The Budget of 1933 was a "look into the future", the title confuses some cataloguers who assume it must have been published in 1933 or later). The publisher, The Daily News, was a leading Liberal paper of the time.

I would be grateful for a complete list of the series. Thank you, DuncanHill (talk) 14:50, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

The British Library Catalogue gives me these eight, bringing the total to, as Mr Starr says, fifteen.

• Sir Frederick Barton Maurice Disarmament (1924)
• Philip Guedalla A Council of Industry (1924)
• Arnold Duncan McNair, Baron McNair The Problem of the Coal Mines (1924)
• James Scorgie Meston, Baron Meston India and the Empire (1924)
• Waldorf Astor, Viscount Astor Temperance and Politics (1925)
• Sir Douglas Henderson Inheritance and Inequality. A Practical Proposal (1926)
• James Scorgie Meston, Baron Meston Drink (1926)
• Philip Henry Kerr, Marquis of Lothian The Industrial Dilemma (1926)

--Antiquary (talk) 16:59, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

And looking for each of the titles on Library Hub Discover I find the numbering of the pamphlets is: 8 McNair, 9 Maurice, 10 Meston India, 11 Guedalla, 12 Astor, 13 Meston Drink, 14 Kerr, 15 Henderson. --Antiquary (talk) 17:27, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

{{re|Antiquary|Thanks again! Largely the sort of names I was expecting to see, tho' I must admit I wasn't expecting to see Maurice contributing. DuncanHill (talk) 18:49, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

DuncanHill your ping didn't work and while Antiquary will probably see your thanks I'll add this ping to make sure :-) MarnetteD|Talk 21:41, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

Au contraire, MarnetteD, most things escape my vigilance. --Antiquary (talk) 22:21, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

Makes me happier that I added the ping Antiquary :-) MarnetteD|Talk 22:25, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

I'm only seeing snippet views on books, but:

• No. 2
• No. 3 archive
• No. 4
• No. 5 Hathitrust
• No. 6 Hathitrust[13]
• No. 7 Hathitrust
• No. 8

if you can see Hathitrust (or geo-relocate your ip to the U.S.). fiveby(zero) 02:41, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

Can't find Maurice Disarmament, but here's a 1922 Oxford Lecture in "International Disarmament" in Essays in Liberalism. fiveby(zero) 03:06, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

@Fiveby: Many thanks. I can't view the Hathi Trust scans, but the others are very useful. The article in Essays in Liberalism may well be the same as the "New Way" booklet, as Essays is a collection of papers from the Summer Schools. DuncanHill (talk) 16:15, 18 November 2020 (UTC)