Talk:Atomic Energy Act of 1946

Sub-pages

Anybody reading this have any suggestions on how to sub categorize this page. It's a very dense topic and I'm having trouble separating all the information. Any advise would be helpful.

Thank you! Ohheyheidi (talk) 21:20, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Peer Editing

I went through your article and did some copy editing in class today. I found that you often separate your sentences by multiple commas in order to fit all the information possible. I think that it is important to go through and figure out the best way possible to separate these sentences so that it is easier for the reader to make sense of what is being said. I also think that your sub heading the Born Secret and the information under it can be expanded a little bit more. You talk about the "second item" and then discuss section 9 but nothing in between. That could help expand on your article. It was a nice touch having all the links to other wikipedia articles within your article and good job so far.

Michalge (talk) 20:42, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

Online ambassador comments

Hi, this is just a quick peer review. I'll try and point out some available sources which aren't in the article, some style issues and some other stuff.

Sources

• Richard Rhodes' Dark Sun: The Making of the Hydrogen Bomb contains some notable information on the 1946 act and the 1954 amendments. Full text of the book is not online but it should be available in any large university library. I list this source not because it is uniquely authoritative on the act alone but because it is brilliantly written and well researched. Should be more fun to look up than the average secondary source.
• A somewhat more bespoke source might be Bryon Miller's A Law Is Passed: The Atomic Energy Act of 1946 in the University of Chicago Law Review--it is on JSTOR here. Bear in mind the article was written in 1948, so while it is a secondary resource, it does not have a great deal of distance from the original act. In fact the whole issue of that law review is devoted to the atomic energy act of 1946.
• You can also go to the NRC's webpage and find a short history of the NRC/AEC. Also there is a government document floating around copy here written in 1963 to serve as a history of the AEC.
• There are a number of other law reviews covering various provisions of the law (patents, industry connections, biomedical provisions, etc)

Style/content

• The lead of the article is too long. For an article of reasonably short length (~1000 words), you can use a 1 paragraph lead and should at most have a 2 paragraph lead. Imagine the lead as the executive summary. If someone lands on this article from a wikipedia link or a web search, what do you want them to know after reading for only a few seconds.
• As you will notice from the sources above, there are other implications of the law not mentioned in the article. The article itself focuses on the "restricted data" component of the AEA and this should be a major focus, but other elements of the law need coverage and we should not give undue weight to one section.
• Be careful making assertions or guarded assertions without a source. saying the act was "probably a factor in the American refusal to allow a French officer to take command of Allied Forces Southern Europe in 1997" requires some source otherwise I have no choice but to interpret the statement as a supposition on the part of a wikipedia author, which does not carry a lot of weight.
• Also, you have used a thesis as a source. while not completely forbidden, we have a lot of trouble judging the reliability of a thesis (masters or PhD) if it has never been published in any form. Usually a good bet for use of a thesis is to confine it to what you would were you publishing a book on the subject: a narrow point of interest left uncovered by other material, not broad support for major claims.

Thats all for now. I think this is a great start to an article and should only improve as breadth and coverage increase. Protonk (talk) 18:03, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Response

Thank you for the review and suggestions. I've shortened the article's introduction and moved the extra information into different subheadings. Bryan Miller's article was a useful source in discussion of the public's involvement in the Act. I will do some more research on the implications of the act and add that information in the next week.

If you have any more suggestions I'd appreciate them. Thank you for taking the time to read this and to provide some good sources.

Ohheyheidi (talk) 18:50, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

Chronological internal coherence

The act is from 1946, but a 1943 Churchill decision ins mentioned as a consequence. How so?

— Leandro GFC Dutra (talk) 18:07, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Control of information and allies' reaction: Belgium?

Belgian reaction should be included. They controlled the most valuable uranium ore deposits at the time and in 1944 agreed to deliver exclusively to the United States and the United Kingdom. In return Belgium would get access to nuclear know how for commercial, non-military applications. Most of the uranium for the Manhattan project (70%) came from Union_Minière_du_Haut_Katanga, a Belgian mining company. In 1939 Edgar_Sengier, the director of the company, shipped 1200 tons of high quality (65% U3O8) uranium ore to the US and stored it in a depot on Staten Island, where it remained until 1942 when the Manhatten project started. DS Belgium (talk) 19:58, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Atomic Energy Act of 1946/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Quadell (talk · contribs) 23:28, 10 December 2013 (UTC)
Nominator: Hawkeye7

I've read the article and made some notes. It's very strong, but the most important and troubling issue with the article is the existance of close paraphrasing.

• Sovacool's paper says "The Atomic Energy Act of 1954 in the US encouraged private corporations to build nuclear reactors... A significant learning phase followed with a slew of early meltdowns and accidents at experimental reactors and research facilities, leading to the introduction of the Price-Anderson Act in 1957, an implicit admission..." This Wikipedia article states "The Atomic Energy Act of 1954 encouraged private corporations to build nuclear reactors; a significant learning phase followed, with many early partial core meltdowns and accidents at experimental reactors and research facilities. This led to the introduction of the Price–Anderson Nuclear Industries Indemnity Act of 1957, which was 'an implicit admission...'" This is way too close, and needs to be reworded from scratch, getting as far from the source's wording as possible.

• Howard Morland's essay says "When the Atomic Energy Act became law, it defined a new legal term “restricted data” as “all data concerning the manufacture or utilization of atomic weapons, the production of fissionable material, or the use of fissionable material in the production of power,” unless the information has been declassified. The phrase “all data” included every suggestion, speculation, scenario, or rumor—past, present, or future, regardless of its source, or even of its accuracy—unless it was declassified." This Wikipedia article states "It defined a new legal term, "restricted data", as "all data concerning the manufacture or utilization of atomic weapons, the production of fissionable material, or the use of fissionable material in the production of power," unless the information has been declassified. The phrase "all data" included every suggestion, speculation, scenario or rumor—past, present or future, regardless of its source, or even of its accuracy—unless it was specifically declassified." This is almost a word-for-word copy; it needs to be completely rewritten to avoid using any of the source's creative language.

It is acceptible to quickfail GA candidates with close paraphrasing issues, but I don't think that's appropriate here. I see that all these issues were already present by the time you, Hawkeye7, got involved in the article, and they are not problems you introduced. I have also looked for close paraphrasing issues in Hewlett&Anderson, Jones, Miller, and Reubhausen (who together constitute most of the sourcing for the article), and have not found any further close-paraphrasing issues. If you can fix these two existing issues, I think we can consider the article to be copyvio-free. Once those are done, the less important issues below can be addressed.

The first one was only recently inserted by Johfos on 7 December. I have re-worded it. The second has been there since 2007, and was inserted by HowardMorland, who probably saw no problem in using his own creative language. Should I re-word it too? Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:58, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

Oh jeez, that was actually Morland himself? Yeah, it should probably be reworded for a number of reasons (tone, avoiding confusion, not having to submit an OTRS statement), but it's not as deal-breakingly important as if it had been a copy-vio. – Quadell ^(talk) 23:11, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

Yes, it was Howard himself, so no copyvio per se. I've re-worded it. Hawkeye7 (talk) 07:54, 14 December 2013 (UTC)

• Capitalization: Sometimes "Bill" is capitalized in the names of bills (e.g. May-Johnson Bill) and sometimes not (Royall-Marbury bill). This should be consistent.

  I'm not sure what the usual form is, but I have capitalised it whenever it is in a title (as above) but left it in lower case when it is just "the bill". Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:58, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

• Organization: It seems to me that the May-Johnson Bill section is prelude to the bill, and should either be a subsection of the Origins section, or should be organized in such a way as to make it clear that it's part of what led up to the AEA. Or perhaps the "May-Johnson Bill" and "MacMahon Bill" sections should be subsections of a "Creation of the Act" section, or something, separating it from sections regarding the Act after its existance. What do you think?

  I see this has been fixed. I like the organization you used. – Quadell ^(talk) 23:11, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

• Lead: The lead does not adequately cover material from all sections of the article.

  Expanded. Let me know if there is something else that should be covered. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:58, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

  That's great, thanks. – Quadell ^(talk) 23:11, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

• Repitition: In the first paragraph of the "May-Johnson Bill" section, it twice says the commission could "acquire property".

  Re-worded. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:58, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

• Clarity: I'm not sure what this means: "The 'wall of secrecy' set up by the Act confined research and development within the country and government." Could you reword?

  Re-worded. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:58, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

• Clarity: When you say Douglas "vigorously defended the section against counterarguments", do you mean Section 10? The previous paragraph said that the section "became 'Control of Information'" and by now "contained" the born secret doctrine and "defined" the term "restricted data". So when this paragraph says she defended the section, it sounds like she's defending the new pro-secrecy provisions. But the next sentence makes it sound like she was opposing the new secrecy. This could be clearer.

  Done. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:58, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

• Sourcing question: The last sentence of the "Private production of nuclear energy" section is quite a strong statement. I can't see the original source. Do you have that source? Does it fully back that statement? What does it say?

  No, I don't. It seems debatable even if supported by the source, and is wandering off-topic. So I have removed it. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:58, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

  Perfect. – Quadell ^(talk) 23:11, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

• NPOV: The article states that the Price-Anderson act "was 'an implicit admission that nuclear power provided risks that producers were unwilling to assume without federal backing'." This is correctly cited to Sovacool's statement, but it's Sovacol's interpretation, which could be contested. I don't think we can state that the act was an implicit admission, though we could say that it was interpreted by Sovacol as an implicit admission.

  Re-worded. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:58, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

• Notes and References: Most sources are fully cited in the References, with short harvard references in the "Notes". But Byrne&Hoffman and Sovacool are fully given in the Notes. I think it would be an improvement to treat those sources like the others (though this is not a requirement for GA status).

  Due to Johfos's recent amendments. I have moved the references down to the notes. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:58, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

Your improvements are terrific, Hawkeye7. I think all that's left is to reword Morland's bit, and it'll be good to go. – Quadell ^(talk) 23:11, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

Excellent work. This article passes all our GA criteria—it's well-written, verifiable with no original research, broad in its coverage, neutral, stable, and appropriately illustrated. I'm pleased to promote it to GA status. – Quadell ^(talk) 15:00, 14 December 2013 (UTC)

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Congressional requests for information pertinent to the act

I'm not sure of the process for making more than minor edits to good or featured articles, so I thought I would raise the topic here.

Independence and Deterrence by Margaret Gowing details enquires made by the US Congress about secret agreements regarding the bomb; enquiries to which May, the chairman of the house committee on military affairs replied that it was his understanding that such agreements existed, but had been unable to obtain details. Meanwhile, another committee member stated "we received definite and positive word without qualification to the effect that there was nothing affecting this legislation that had not been completely published and publicised". Gowing concludes this brief interlude on the details of House deliberations by stating that McMahon told the British Minister of Defence in 1949 that had he known about the agreements, there would have been no act, and told Churchill the same in 1952. Currently, our article includes the very last element of this, the statement to Churchill, but I believe the rest is relevant and important to understanding the context in which the bill was signed in.

Would anyone object in principle to the inclusion of details relating to this, and would anyone object to a broader explanation of the British reactions to the bill?

BilledMammal (talk) 05:20, 2 September 2021 (UTC)

That sounds fine. The main thing is not to drift off-topic. If you are concerned about it, you can post the proposed text on the talk page here. I have Gowing's books here. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 06:47, 2 September 2021 (UTC)

They are excellent books; engaging and informative; the only negative is their age, but given her access to confidential files I don't believe that is much of an impediment. But to return to the topic, my plan is to finish at least the McMahon Act section of the article I am drafting for the Modus Vivendi, and then use that as a springboard for to propose changes for this; thank you for the advice. BilledMammal (talk) 03:31, 4 September 2021 (UTC)

That would be a great article. I look forward to seeing it. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 05:50, 4 September 2021 (UTC)

Wikipedia Ambassador Program course assignment

This article is the subject of an educational assignment at James Madison University supported by WikiProject United States Public Policy and the Wikipedia Ambassador Program during the 2011 Spring term. Further details are available on the course page.

The above message was substituted from {{WAP assignment}} by PrimeBOT (talk) on 16:27, 2 January 2023 (UTC)