Talk:Henry Middleton

Assessment comment

The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Henry Middleton/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 The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.

Good what there is, but needs much more - he was First President of the Continental Congress - and we know more about his children than we do about him. Usual things needed - background, interests, picture and so on. Edofedinburgh 03:48, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Last edited at 03:48, 18 March 2007 (UTC). Substituted at 17:44, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

Dispute unsourced Founding Father label

No prominent source can be found on the internet regarding Henry Middleton as Founding Father of the United States. The reason is that he opposed the Declaration of Independence, left Congress when it was adopted, and swore an oath of loyalty to George III. Absent multiple sources that hold otherwise, the label will be removed. Allreet (talk) 05:32, 9 February 2022 (UTC)

The signers of the other three founding documents are accepted per sources and various talk page discussions as Founding Fathers, and since there is no dispute that the Continental Association is a founding document, site consistency applies. Besides the defining 2017 Werther article "Analyzing the Founders: A Closer Look at the Signers of Four Founding Documents" in the Journal of the American Revolution here are two other sources which, for consistency and per WP:COMMONSENSE, acknowledge that the Founders include the signers of the fourth: The Founder of the Day article "Signers of the Continental Association" clearly states "Below is a list of the Founders who signed the Continental Association" [emphasis mine], followed by the names of the 53 signers (Founder of the Day also names the Association as one of the four founding documents). The worldhistory.edu "Top 10 Founding Fathers of the United States of America" - section "List of Founding Fathers of the United States" asserts "Also, two broader groups of Founding Fathers capture the signers of Articles of Confederation (the initial version of the American Constitution which was adopted in 1777 and ratified in 1781) and the signers of the Continental Association (created on October 20, 1774)" [emphasis mine]. Please add these sources to the pages of the other Association signers you are intent of removing from Founding Father status, thanks. Randy Kryn (talk) 12:32, 9 February 2022 (UTC)

No, @User:Randy Kryn, you elevated Middleton to Founding Father status without a citation to hang on it. Prior to your campaign of changes to over 50 articles, nobody considered signers of the Continental Association and Articles of Confederation to be Founding Fathers, unless they had done something else worthy of note. Middleton, though, presents a most unusual case: a Founder who opposed independence. Interesting.

To let others know, none of the sources mentioned above are reliable. Richard Werther's article would be except for how its meaning has been distorted. And the two websites mentioned are completely inconsequential. What matters is positions expressed by more credible sources, historians in other journal articles and institutions of some authority, such as the National Archives and U.S. Congress. But I'll let them speak for themselves once I begin changing what needs to be changed. Allreet (talk) 09:48, 23 February 2022 (UTC)