Talk:List of special elections to the United States Senate

message: I don't know what kind of citation you need for Lee having been the first directly elected senator.  The 17th Amendment went into effect on April 8, 1913.  His special election was in November of 1913.  There were no other special elections that year. -- ANONYMOUS
*I put "" there so we can cite the source for the claim. (See WP:NOR).  Before the 17th Amendment to the United States Constitution,  there were direct elections in some states, depending on state law. But the Amendment mandated direct elections in every state. —Markles 16:51, 27 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: First direct election

message: Shortly after I created this article, I added a column for "Election."  The idea I had at the time was linking to the articles which discussed the actual elections in depth.  For example, for the Mel Carnahan row, the election link is United States Senate elections, 2002 (piped as "[[United States Senate elections, 2002|2002") because in that election, his elected successor (Jim Talent) was selected.
But now that this page as evolved with the very able work of User:ModRocker86, I now realize that there's a problem with this column.  In some cases, the link doesn't actually go to an article about the corresponding election. See, for example, the Lloyd Bentsen row, in which Kay Bailey Hutchison was elected on June 5, 1993, and not in conjunction with a November general election.
Keep in mind that there ought to be some link to articles which discuss each election in depth.
Any suggestions on what to do?—Markles 23:16, 5 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I believe most of the off year special elections are mentioned, atleast in passing, in the general election articles.  For example, the Hutchison election was mentioned in the text of United States Senate elections, 1992 even though it is not in the election results table.  Perhaps the link could go to whichever election article mentions the special election in question.ModRocker86 04:54, 6 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Election" column 

message: Can somebody add Nebraska in 1986 where Bob Kerrey beat David Karnes.  The info for the people is on the Senate Elections pages for 82 and 88.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.21.177.3 (talk) 04:19, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Nebraska: 1986

message: Prior to the 17th Amendment, most (but not all) states picked their Senators as per the original text Article "…chosen by the Legislature thereof…."  They weren't elected or appointed but chosen.
If some of them were mid-term, should we include those Senators as specially "elected"?  I'm inclined to say No, but I'm really not sure.  Let's develop a consensus here.—Markles 13:24, 20 December 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm gonna say No as well. This page and all the other Senate election articles are designed to cover popular elections. Adding Senators chosen by legislatures dilutes the original purpose of this article to chronicle all popular Senate special elections.Moodyfloydwhofan (talk) 14:51, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

text: *Was that the original purpose of this article?  I created this article by copying the idea from List of special elections to the United States House of Representatives. I really don't know if I had a purpose one way or the other.  I guess it could be seen as a list of elections to fill an open seat.  I'm not inclined to agree with that idea, but I'm just throwing it out there. —Markles 15:31, 20 December 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: *Well, you are right as I don't know what your original purpose was in creating the article. Still, the article is "List of special elections to the United States Senate" and I don't think being chosen by a legislature constitutes an election.Moodyfloydwhofan (talk) 21:45, 20 December 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Selection by legislatures 

message: An editor added the 1982 Senate election in NJ as a Special Election.  Was it actually a special election?  Didn't Williams's term just come to an end and Brady didn't seek the elected seat? I think Brady then resigned after Lautenberg was elected and Lautenberg was appointed to get advantageous seniority.  —Markles 11:40, 20 January 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  NJ 1982 

message: Should we sort the list by the date of the vacancy or by the date of the special election?  It is, after all, a list about elections, not about vacancies.—Markles 10:47, 3 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Oh, I didn't even notice that they were sorted by vacancy at first... Yes, I'd say by election, then by vacancy. —Nightstallion 10:54, 3 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreed. By date of election.DCmacnut<> 16:23, 3 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreed. -Rrius (talk) 22:19, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

text: *Election. It's a list of Elections. Sort by vacancies for the "List of vacancies of the U.S. Senate". Some vacancies failed to have the action of state authorities to achieve a special election, and were filled by the general election. -- Yellowdesk (talk) 23:35, 5 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree with Yellowdesk Pvmoutside (talk) 11:56, 7 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Do you two think you are disagreeing with anyone? The previous editors, including me, were saying that it should be sorted by election date. Nightstallion was saying that if there are two or more elections on the same day, they should sorted by the date of the vacancy. Dcmacnut and I agreed with that. -Rrius (talk) 15:24, 8 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: On second viewing, that looks snarky, but I meant the question straight. Anyway, I've gone ahead and re-ordered the list. -Rrius (talk) 15:59, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

text: *Just responding in the form of the question as put forward by Markles.  -- Yellowdesk (talk) 14:36, 11 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: *In your edit summary for the contribution I am now responding to, you asked where the conversation I mention is. I would refer you to everything said between Markles's question and your response to it. I merely what happened there. -Rrius (talk) 14:48, 11 September 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sort order 

message: This below from Seventeenth Amendment to the United States Constitution -- Yellowdesk (talk) 14:33, 11 September 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Direct elections held in the states

message: *Mark Hanna was appointed senator from Ohio on March 5, 1897 vice John Sherman (Ohio), resigned the previous day to become secretary of state.  He was elected by the legislature on January 12, 1898 for the remainder of Sherman's term expiring March 4, 1899.  When Hanna died in February 1904, he had already been re-elected by the legislature, which reconvened later in 1904 to have two special elections, both of which Charles Dick, who had been appointed by Governor Myron Herrick, both for the remainder of Hanna's 1899-1905 term, and then for the subsequent term which Hanna had been elected to but of course never served.  Hope this helps.--Wehwalt (talk) 13:55, 20 February 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Two others 

message: Is an election to a "new seat" a "special" election? If so, then we'd need to add elections for 74 seats (2 x 37 states that weren't original 13).  I don't think they should be counted in this list.  Late elections aren't counted; those are the ones before the 17th amendment in which the state legislature failed to elect a Senator before the congress began. I welcome further discussion.  —GoldRingChip  12:11, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Alaska and Hawaii are the only states that have been admitted since the 17th Amendment, so without doing further research, AFAIK they're the only states whose Senate seats were originally filled by popular vote. I would count the 1958 Alaska elections as special, in the popular-election sense of the term, because they were both for less than six-year terms, and the 1959 Hawaii elections as special because they didn't occur on a standard federal election day and the terms didn't start at the beginning of a Congress. I don't think that sets a precedent that we have to go back and dig up every original legislative election to every newly-created seat from Vermont to Arizona and add it to the list if it didn't occur at the standard time or for a standard term. But in any case, the list does come with the disclaimer that it's incomplete. JTRH (talk) 14:41, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

text: "Without doing further research" means I hadn't noticed the discussion of Arizona a couple of paragraphs above. But my point stands. JTRH (talk) 21:55, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Should new seats be counted as "special"? 

message: The Joseph Taylor Robinson article claims he was the last Senator elected by a legislature, on Jan. 27, 1913 (only four days after his predecessor had been elected to fill an unexpired term). But the Lawrence Yates Sherman article says he was elected by his state legislature on Mar. 26, 1913. Can we clear this up? JTRH (talk) 21:59, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Who was the last Senator elected by a legislature? 

message: A couple of few things I'd like to see added to the chart, if someone has time:
#A designation for those Senators who were popularly elected prior to the ratification of the Seventeenth Amendment;
#When an appointee is not the winner of the subsequent special election, an indication of whether he/she did not seek election, was defeated for nomination, or defeated for election to the remainder of the term;
#An indication that Kennedy, Johnson, Obama, Biden, etc., were President-elect or Vice President-elect at the time of their resignation from the Senate (it's already given in prose form in Nixon's entry, but a footnote for all would be preferable).
JTRH (talk) 18:22, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Additional information 

message: I haven't done much of this sort of thing on Wikipedia, and sorry if this is a Talk page non-sequitur, but the MA special election concluded, and I don't know how to add the results because I don't know how these tables work. Just needed to tell someone about it to be added.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.118.90.238 (talk) 04:04, 14 July 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  New election 

message: This is a very helpful resource, but I noticed a couple errors in reviewing elections held separately from congressional elections. For example:
* Andrew Johnson in 1857 was picked by the legislature, not an election. I would be surprised if many 19th century selections were done by popular election.
* The Nevada election in 1942 was in November, not December. (The winner's page on Wikipedia says <<Later, he was elected as a Democrat to Congress and served from 1933 until December 7, 1942, when he resigned, having been elected to the United States Senate to fill the unexpired term of Key Pittman on November 3, 1942. Scrugham served from December 7, 1942, until his death on June 23, 1945>>
I assume someone can fix these in the chart, but others ideally would be factchecked.  
RRichie (talk) 16:13, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: Almost all Senators before 1911 were elected by the state legislatures, regular as well as special elections. The US Constitution was changed then, requiring popular elections. The legislative elections are elections, nonetheless. Kraxler (talk) 16:26, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  needs factcheck 

message: "Since 1913, 184 senators have been appointed to fill vacancies. Of those, 63 did not later run for election; 56 ran and lost the subsequent special election; and 60 ran and won the election."
There's a couple of problems here
1) 63, 56, and 60 do not add up to 184
2)The source (from 2009) actually states 183, 62, 56, and 60 - which also doesn't add up
--Khajidha (talk) 20:23, 18 April 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  My cut 

message: Al Franken has not resigned. He has announced his intention to do so in the near future. That is not the same thing. And December 7 was not the effective date in any case. I don't know how to do the code that renders something invisible until it actually takes effect, while preserving it for future use. Can someone do that, please? That's better than eliminating it entirely. JTRH (talk) 18:31, 14 December 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Franken 

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