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June 15, 2005Featured list candidatePromoted
October 30, 2008Featured list removal candidateDemoted
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Current status: Former featured list

List indexing the table

I suggest adding this "table TOC", a compact list indexing the table. Lots of readers probably just want the actual list of presidents without scrolling through a long table, 12 screens on my desktop. Or they only want to see a few entries like the recent ones, 10+ screens down. The table is 70 times longer than the list on my screen. I added the list but was reverted by Drdpw. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:41, 21 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Birth and death under name

I suggest adding the president's birth and death under their name like this revision. This is done in most lists of countries' heads of states or governments such as List of prime ministers of Canada, List of presidents of Russia and List of chancellors of Germany, among others. I feel that this list is too bland compared to other lists of countries' leaders. Cyrobyte (talk) 16:30, 11 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Support - just to make it official. - wolf 15:58, 12 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with the above. It's not intrusive and provides info. Let's keep it at that, though. BeenAroundAWhile (talk) 03:19, 12 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Ford note

@Drdpw: this note (or a variation of) seems like it might a worthwhile addition. Considering the column header is simply: "Election", it's entirely possible, (if not likely), that at least for some people, that will "imply" that Ford was elected.
(ping: Krisgabwoosh) Jmho & Cheers - wolf 00:32, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Ford's situation, is the same as Tyler's, Fillmore's, A. Johnson's & Arthur's terms, as well as T. Roosevelt's, Coolidge's, Truman's & L. Johnson's first terms. All succeeded to a term of office that was established by previous election. GoodDay (talk) 00:51, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The difference to the examples above is that Tyler, Fillmore, etc. were all elected vice president and so it makes sense to an extent to show the election cycle through which they entered office. For Ford, the situation is unique in that he did not participate in any election cycle as a vice presidential candidate. At least to me, the table seemed to imply that Ford was elected vice president in 1972 in the same way someone like Truman was elected v.p. in '44. Krisgabwoosh (talk) 01:51, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Doesn't matter, he became veep, then prez during the January 20, 1973 to January 20, 1977 presidential/vice presidential term. We handle Ford's (and Rockefeller's) situation the same way, at the veep list article. GoodDay (talk) 01:55, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Good enough for me. Though perhaps a note should be added specifying that by "Election" the column refers to the term of office that election established rather than the election the president was elected in. Krisgabwoosh (talk) 02:02, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
From my understanding of the eight Presidents that died in office, they were all succeeded by a VP that was on the ticket and elected with them. After Agnew resigned, Ford was nominated and confirmed by the Senate, and so he was not elected, as either VP or President. When I saw the note added, it reminded me of the very unique circumstances that lead to Ford assuming the Oval Office. A very singular set of circumstances whereby the man was never elected by the people to President, nor even elected as a VP, where voters understand the possibility that the VP might end up assuming the office of POTUS. And so that is why I thought I would raise the issue here for discussion. Of all the notes we do have in this article (and there are quite a few), this actaully seems to be a worthy addition. (jmho) Cheers guys - wolf 03:58, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Wouldn't the easiest solution be to make the "election" header either Election cycle or ((abbr|Election|Election cycle))? SSSB (talk) 09:36, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
A hovertitle or an abbr would be my choice. It avoids the need for a lengthy note while clearing the issue. Krisgabwoosh (talk) 22:28, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Sortability

Hello! I think the table should be sortable. The issue is that merged cells aren't compatible with sorting. Therefore, I propose that there should be one row for each presidency. Multiple vice presidencies could be placed into the same cell, with term start/end times added. A demonstration of how this would look:

Presidency[a] Portrait Name
(Birth–Death) 		Party[b] Election Vice President
1 April 30, 1789
–
March 4, 1797 		George Washington
(1732–1799) 		style="background-color:Template:Independent (politician)/meta/color" | Unaffiliated 1788–89
1792 		John Adams[c]
3 March 4, 1801
–
March 4, 1809 		Thomas Jefferson
(1743–1826) 		style="background-color:Template:Democratic-Republican Party/meta/color" | Democratic-
Republican 		1800
1804 		Aaron Burr
George Clinton
4 March 4, 1809
–
March 4, 1817 		James Madison
(1751–1836) 		style="background-color:Template:Democratic-Republican Party/meta/color" | Democratic-
Republican 		1808
1812 		George Clinton[d]
Vacant (after Apr. 20, 1812)
Elbridge Gerry[d]
Vacant (after Nov. 23, 1814)
6 March 4, 1825
–
March 4, 1829 		John Quincy Adams
(1767–1848) 		style="background: linear-gradient(Template:Democratic-Republican Party/meta/color 50%, #ffecd7 50%);" | Democratic-Republican[e]
National Republican 		1824 John C. Calhoun[f][g]
notes

Notes

  1. ^ Presidents are numbered according to uninterrupted periods served by the same person. For example, George Washington served two consecutive terms and is counted as the first president (not the first and second). Upon the resignation of 37th president Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford became the 38th president even though he simply served out the remainder of Nixon's second term and was never elected to the presidency in his own right. Grover Cleveland was both the 22nd president and the 24th president because his two terms were not consecutive. A vice president who temporarily becomes acting president under the Twenty-fifth Amendment to the Constitution is not counted, because the president remains in office during such a period.
  2. ^ Reflects the president's political party at the start of their presidency. Changes during their time in office are noted. Also reflects the vice president's political party unless otherwise noted beside the individual's name.
  3. ^ Political parties had not been anticipated when the Constitution was drafted in 1787 and ratified in 1788, nor did they exist at the time of the first presidential election in 1788–89. When they did develop, during Washington's first term, Adams joined the faction that became the Federalist Party. The elections of 1792 were the first ones in the United States that were contested on anything resembling a partisan basis.
  4. ^ a b Died in office of natural causes.
  5. ^ Early during Adams' term the Democratic-Republican Party dissolved; his allies in Congress and at the state-level were referred to as "Adams' Men" during the Adams presidency. When Andrew Jackson became president in 1829, this group became the "Anti-Jackson" opposition, and organized themselves as the National Republican Party.
  6. ^ John Calhoun, formerly a Democratic-Republican, founded the Nullifier Party in 1828 to oppose the Tariff of 1828 and advance the cause of states' rights, but was brought on as Andrew Jackson's running mate in the 1828 presidential election in an effort to broaden the democratic coalition led by Jackson.
  7. ^ Resigned from office

What do you think? Tol (talk | contribs) @ 21:39, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

No, let's not fix what's not broken. It's best we don't repeat the veeps (Clinton & Calhoun). GoodDay (talk) 21:46, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I personally think the benefit gained with sortability (mainly to sort by name) outweighs repeating the vice presidents, but I'm open to other opinions. Tol (talk | contribs) @ 23:16, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I don't see anything wrong with the status quo. It ain't broke, so don't fix it. GoodDay (talk) 23:19, 21 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Agree with GoodDay, don't see a need to make all these changes for little, if any, benefit. - wolf 01:35, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

On a side note. @Tol: in future, would you bring all your proposals to the talkpage & seek consensus here, rather then boldly make changes? It would save a lot of reverting. GoodDay (talk) 01:41, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@GoodDay: If I don't think something will be contentious, I just do it. I really didn't think my changes would be reverted (I'll open a new section to discuss them). Tol (talk | contribs) @ 02:59, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The table should sort correctly now. I don't see what would be contentious about this. Reywas92Talk 19:20, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Reywas92: Sorting doesn't work correctly with merged cells. Try sorting by number ascending, and you'll see what happens. Tol (talk | contribs) @ 19:22, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I'm confused, what the problem? Now it goes 1, 1, 2, 3, 3 but that's still correct sorting. Why don't we just make that column unsortable then? I agree that the benefit of sortability outweighs this. Reywas92Talk 19:27, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It generates duplicates with any sorting method, which are most clear when you sort by number. My proposal above would have fixed this problem, at the cost of vice presidents not having their own cells. I think this would be preferable itself, because this is a list of presidents, not of vice presidents. Tol (talk | contribs) @ 19:43, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Best not to make such edits, without a consensus. GoodDay (talk) 19:24, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I think Wikipedia:Be bold would disagree. It created a duplication problem (no errors and no incorrect information) that was only present if someone tried to sort the table, and was quickly reverted. Tol (talk | contribs) @ 19:41, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
If you both are going to persist in this? Then I would recommend either of you 'open' an RFC on the matter. GoodDay (talk) 19:45, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Tol: you've got some nerve. You just claim that there isn't any opposition (Special:Diff/1055783291, when there clearly was (you even provided a permalink to prove the opposition. While I'm here, the disadvantage of merging vice-president cells/duplicate cells when sorting outweighs any benefits (which are negligable). SSSB (talk) 19:58, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Indeed, I just read the edit-summary-in-question & must say, it really peeved me off. There most definitely is opposition to his proposals. GoodDay (talk) 20:03, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@SSSB and @GoodDay: That was an entirely different edit; did you look at the diff? I added header scope, and did not reinstate the contested wording changes or sorting. If you read the section in question that I linked to in the edit summary, you would see that nobody made any arguments against adding header scope. Header scope helps with screen reader accessibility, see Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Accessibility/Data tables tutorial#Overview of basics. Tol (talk | contribs) @ 20:05, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
There is opposition to it. GoodDay (talk) 20:08, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@GoodDay: Well, now you are opposing it, but (in #Recent edits & reversions) you said that it was only a "procedural revert". Nobody complained about the header scope, which is an entirely different change from sorting. @Kavyansh.Singh, who also commented, only commented that uncontroversial edits do not need consensus. Can you please take a look at the diff? What about adding semantic data for screen readers do you disagree with? Tol (talk | contribs) @ 20:11, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I'm heading out for a walk (be back in 'bout an hour), please follow my advice & open up an RFC for all list articles of US office holders. PS - I'm considering (in future) to open an AFD on all of them, if that's what it will take to end these 'persistent' attempts to change their content without consensus. GoodDay (talk) 20:18, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@GoodDay: Alright; I'll start drafting it, though I don't know if it should really cover all lists of US office holders. I think it should cover three distinct topics that are all apparently contentious: sorting (probably the most), column scope (which I really though would be entirely uncontroversial), and column order. Tol (talk | contribs) @ 20:22, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
At least have it cover both this article & the veep list article. GoodDay (talk) 21:30, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

That makes sense; I'll expand it to cover that. Tol (talk | contribs) @ 21:46, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Definitely agree that, instead of this constant back-n-forth, just post an RfC on the matter. You not only have a much better chance at a consensus one way or t'other, but there might even be alternatives presented that haven't been considered. (But Tol, make you are honest and forthright if you decide to write up an RfC, and don't misrepresent anyone's position, or anything that has previously occurred). Also, fwiw, while bold improvements are indeed encouraged in the P&G, I agree with GoodDay's request to suggest changes on the talk page first, if they involve a lot of changes. Not only it is it a shame to see all that work undone if consensus doesn't favor it after the fact, but it's also a pain in the ass to have to revert it all. But for simple straightforward edits, if you think it makes the article better, then go for it. (JMHO) - wolf 22:21, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Thewolfchild: Yep; I'm drafting one in my sandbox. I'd welcome any suggested changes (if it's reasonable and uncontroversial, feel free to just edit it; this is a wiki, after all). Your last sentence is why I'm so perplexed that GoodDay is reverting column scope improvements for screen reader accessibility, but it's apparently contested, so I'm including it in the RfC too. Tol (talk | contribs) @ 22:52, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
You can't claim there is no opposition to adding column scopes if nobody had mentioned column scopes at the time, that's why I raised it. I was confused because the thread you linked included opposition to all changes you proposed. So whilst it is true I didn't look at the diff (my apologies), your edit summary was misleading to the point of confusing me. SSSB (talk) 23:29, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I had mentioned scopes in the thread I linked to in the summary. Tol (talk | contribs) @ 00:08, 18 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Wait, since when are merged cells not compatible with sorting? Try sorting List of governors of Alabama, it works fine. It leads to some repeated cells when a merge had to be split, but that's a minor edge case that you're chasing. The benefits of the merged cells vastly outweighs the cost of an ugly sort; it still sorts. --Golbez (talk) 23:35, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I think the point of view that I and a few others hold is that the repeated cells are an "ugly sort" and undesirable. Tol (talk | contribs) @ 00:10, 18 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
But is that ugliness worth losing the benefits? Of all the people who come to this page, only a few will sort, and even fewer will care that it's a little wonky, because they're looking for - presumably - just the president, or party. I'd say the aesthetic benefits of the merging for 99% of readers outweighs the concern of the aesthetic drawbacks for 1%. --Golbez (talk) 02:42, 18 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Side note: If anyone proposes giving each president's & vice president's name (here & at the veep list article) a different colour? I'll cry. GoodDay (talk) 23:50, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@GoodDay: You mean like this...? ;-) - wolf 01:29, 18 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Oh my... (I am generally fine with others editing my comments, but in this case I'd like you to self-revert so that those who read the section don't think I was seriously proposing that.) Tol (talk | contribs) @ 01:33, 18 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Recent edits & reversions

Hello @GoodDay and @Thewolfchild. I'd like to explain my recent edits:

Could you please explain why you reverted them? Thanks, Tol (talk | contribs) @ 03:05, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Procedural revert, as you didn't get a consensus at this talkpage, for the change you made. GoodDay (talk) 03:08, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@GoodDay: Wikipedia:Be bold: one doesn't need consensus for everything. Per Wikipedia:BOLD, revert, discuss cycle (which you quoted in this edit, and I therefore assume you have read), one should "Revert an edit if it is not an improvement" (emphasis added), and only then it should be discussed. The whole point of "be bold" is that editors should not have to seek consensus for everything — only when others disagree. Do you have any complaint about the actual content of the edits? Tol (talk | contribs) @ 03:15, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I'll leave it to the others here, to decide. PS - You don't have to ping me, as I've got this article on my watchlist. GoodDay (talk) 03:18, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Tol: As I stated in my edit summary, I don't believe your changes were necessary or an improvement. Simply put, there was no need to gut that paragraph. The section was not overly long (or non-neutral) and did not need to be "trimmed". As for the change of "presidents" to "presidencies" up in the other section... meh, I'll leave it to others to weigh in on that and I'll accept a decision either way. Lastly, I watch this page as well, so pinging me here is also not necessary. - wolf 03:46, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Well, in an article like this, Wikipedia:BOLD, revert, discuss cycle should be practiced, but not for reverting uncontroversial edits. I'll leave it for others to decide which edits are controversial and which are not. I just added template in the table, and have given appropriate explanation in the edit summary, so I don't think that has to be reverted. – Kavyansh.Singh (talk) 04:19, 22 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Erm... what's the point of this comment? You already posted a lengthy edit summary in support of you uncontroversial, and minor, edit. Is this some kind of pre-emptive argument? I don't have a problem with your edit. But in general, if someone disagrees with an edit you've made, they're gonna revert it. Then it's up to both of you to ensure you have policy and/or consensus in your favor. - wolf 22:21, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I made an edit to a page, where almost all edits which were not discussed on the talk page are reverted (in maximum cases, the revert is rightfully done). But ... I think that my edit for uncontroversial enough to be made directly. The only purpose of the above comments is to inform the talk page of the edit. – Kavyansh.Singh (talk) 08:45, 18 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

As mentioned in the (above) discussion. Open up an RFC covering all list of American official articles. Attempting to force in such changes in this article or related articles, isn't the way to do it. GoodDay (talk) 19:56, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Semi-protected edit request on 29 October 2021

I would like edit access to this because I would like to make a mock presidental timeline in edit mode but I will not publish these changes Flotushistory (talk) 21:17, 29 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

 Not done: this is not the right page to request additional user rights. You may reopen this request with the specific changes to be made and someone will add them for you, or if you have an account, you can wait until you are autoconfirmed and edit the page yourself. You can click on the "view source" tab and copy the wikitext into your sandbox if you would like to make test edits. Tol (talk | contribs) @ 21:22, 29 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Column ordering

I think these tables look much better with the image and name on the far left – the person is the most important and should be listed first, then dates after that. Virtually every other list of presidents, prime ministers, etc. has the portrait and name on the left of the table, with term of office to the right. The term is also complimentary to the election year, so it would make sense to have those closer or adjacent to each other too. Reywas92Talk 19:32, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Disagree. The article isn't broken, so stop trying to fix it. GoodDay (talk) 19:34, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with Reywas. The focus of the row should be the first datapoint in it, not in the middle. --Golbez (talk) 19:37, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I also agree with Reywas92. The article may not be broken, but that's not an argument against improvement. This is improvement, not fixing. Tol (talk | contribs) @ 20:17, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Meh. I don't really see this as a change for the better, or worse. I also don't see a point in making a change just for the sake of making a change. It's been fine the way it is for some time, so might as well leave it be. - wolf 22:21, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

FWIW, can we also remember that there's the List of vice presidents of the United States article? If any changes are made to this article, then they should also be made to the other article. GoodDay (talk) 20:21, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed, but that's no reason to deny changes to this one. --Golbez (talk) 20:25, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Accessibility is required. Making the table accessible does, however, reveal a failure of the article, in that now the row scoped cell is a name and a range of years. This betrays the fact that that cell should not be containing two different datapoints. Notwithstanding my opinion that we don't need the lifespan in this article, it's just bad form in terms of accessibility and presentation. I'll take this opportunity to again propose removing the lifespan. --Golbez (talk) 20:27, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Get a consensus for the changes you want made. Trying to force such changes, will only cause tension. GoodDay (talk) 21:12, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Shrug; if you care so much to prevent accessibility improvements, you're welcome to it. I have better things to do than try to convince people that accessibility is good. --Golbez (talk) 21:52, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Golbez: Wait... wut? Why are you against making "accessibility improvements"...? - wolf 22:22, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Some epic misreading there, mate. --Golbez (talk) 23:12, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Uh, no... you said you said you had better things to do than help people with accessibility problems. It's right there "mate". - wolf 23:44, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Thewolfchild: hold up, okay, I'm going to enjoy this: So person A says "you can't make this accessible, not on my watch", person B says "ok you can have your article" and you think person B is the one worthy of complaint? I gave you the benefit of the doubt earlier, but you didn't latch on, so here, I'll spell it out as simple as I can: If GoodDay cares so much about making it so that we can't add accessibility tags to the article, then I'm not going to waste my time trying to convince them. You're more than welcome to, but I'm not in a mood for petty bullshit. So, to clarify, friend: I'm very much for accessibility improvements. That's why I made them, if you would be so kind as to check the page history. And GoodDay reverted them. So, I hope that explains. --Golbez (talk)
You "enjoy" lengthy, angry, profanity filled rants? I don't. I think we're done here. - wolf 15:32, 18 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Thewolfchild: I think you've got it wrong. (This is long, but bear with me.) On 21 October, I initially reworded and trimmed the lead, and then added header scope (screen reader accessibility improvements) and added the "unsortable" class in case sortability was added later. The latter edit was reverted by Drdpw for "unnecessary markup", so I restored the header scope (for screen reader accessibility) but not the unsortable class (as it would do nothing unless the table were to be sortable), with an explanation of why scope is necessary in my edit summary. This partial restoration was also reverted by GoodDay, who cited BRD. At this point, I started #Recent edits & reversions above, where GoodDay said that reversion was a "procedural revert, as [I] didn't get a consensus at this talkpage". Nobody opposed the addition of header scope (screen reader accessibility) for three weeks, so I added it again on 17 November. GoodDay reverted again, again citing BRD and that it needs consensus. Golbez again restored header scope, and also changed the header column from the number to the name, saying that "no consensus [is] required for accessibility". GoodDay reverted this too, again saying that consensus is needed. That's where we are now. Tol (talk | contribs) @ 23:04, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
You may want to have an RFC on that, too. Why? because I'm getting a headache. GoodDay (talk) 23:07, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Yep, just put in all the RfC. No sense going over it all again here. - wolf 23:44, 17 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Now, as we are talking about a RfC, may I also suggest to add the fact that images here lack ALT text. While ALT text is not directly part of the FL criteria, it does help the screen readers, and I can think of no disadvantages of that addition. I wouldn't have brought this up if images has caption, but as they don't have caption, (rightfully) I think ALT text is necessary. Also, I might be a little nitpicky here, but the sources listed for the list doesn't discuss the exact dates of presidential tenure. Almost entire lead section and all footnotes are un-cited (And I know I'll be reverted if I add citation needed tags) – Kavyansh.Singh (talk) — Preceding undated comment added 09:01, 18 November 2021‎ (UTC)[reply]

I'm really wondering if maybe all these list articles across Wikipedia, should be deleted as trivia articles. There is a growing movement to delete such articles, as I've been to some of the recent AfDs of such articles, which resulted in 'delete'. GoodDay (talk) 15:32, 18 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Not all, but yeah, we have strong momentum to delete trivia lists. We can expect that "List of presidents/vice presidents/prime minsters of ABC" will surely won't be deleted, but there are strong chances that lists like "List of presidents of ABC by age", "by length of tenure", "by death date", etc. would be at-least nominated for deletion. And I don't expect these trivia lists to be in printed encyclopedia. – — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kavyansh.Singh (talk • contribs) 15:44, 18 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed; I really don't think that those lists would be particularly helpful. If those data are helpful, then they should be included in the main list and the main list should be made sortable. I'd welcome the addition of alt text. I don't know what should be put in it — I'd think that it would be obvious that the picture is of the president in that row — but perhaps it could include date and medium (such as "2004 photograph of someone, wearing something"). Tol (talk | contribs) @ 18:57, 18 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
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