Talk:Mason-Dixon line

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Contents 1 Emancipation 2 Name Clarification 3 Explanation of partial revert 4 Sources 5 RfC 6 Dixieland

[edit] Emancipation

"During and after the American Revolution, 46.000 thousand Loyalists (according to Canadian sources as in the book "True Blue") " This was contributed by an undependable anon. Were slaves in these states freed by the Emancipation Proclamation or was it at the end of the War? Please amend if necessary. --Wetman 06:04, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

I do not understand your quote about the loyalists. Nevertheless, the Emancipation Proclamation only applied to states "in rebellion." It did not apply to Maryland, Delaware, or even portions of the confederacy that had been pacified (such as some counties in Virginia and certain parishes in Louisiana). The Maryland Constitution of 1864 ended slavery there, ratified on October 13, 1864. The Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution banned slavery on all U.S. soil, including Delaware. It was ratified on December 6, 1865, although Delaware voted against it (decades later they ratified it). Although there were minor actions for two months afterwards, the war effectively ended with Lee's surrender on April 9, 1865. — Eoghanacht ^talk 15:03, 2005 September 7 (UTC)

[edit] Name Clarification

This article makes no mention as who Mason and Dixon are. What are their first names? Is Mason Geroge Mason, father of the Bill of Rights and author of Virigina's constitution? Or is it just some guy? If it is George Mason, how did he get involved in surverying?--Atlastawake 19:44, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

Astronomer Charles Mason and surveyor Jeremiah Dixon both came from England to do this work. NoSeptember 23:12, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Explanation of partial revert

In order to avoid more delays in editing this page (there is a lot to do outhere), why don't you open two headings (i.e. "geography" and "culture")? Every boundary (internal or external) in the world has both geographical and cultural components, so there is really nothing special about the Mason-Dixon Line (i.e. North and South cyprus, parallel 38 in the Koreas). Furthermore, this is an encyclopedia and it should contain all aspects of the subject. If the Mason-Dixon line is a cultural boundary is because people talk about it in that way (even if the line does not extend to the Western part of the country). I think that you should present both, the cultural and geographic aspects of it, even if you don't agree with the other position. Wikipedia should be as objective as possible. Astharoth1 21:53, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

I just reverted most details of this edit, by User:WhiskyWhiskers. The reason is that I strongly disagree with omitting all references to the "pop culture" Mason Dixon line from the introduction. The fact that "Mason-Dixon" line means two different things should be made clear up front. I also don't see one usage as more "real" than the other, but we can leave that question for the philosophers, I imagine.

Anyway, I thought I'd post my reasoning here. If you want to revert me, please discuss here, too. -GTBacchus^(talk) 20:18, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Ok, an anon reverted me with the edit summary "Wikipedia should be about facts, not imagining". I'm bringing the discussion to the talk page, where it belongs.

Now, the fact that, in popular usage, the "Mason-Dixon line" is the cultural boundary between North and South is not an "imagining". Most of the time, when people say "Mason-Dixon line", that's what they mean. The introduction to an article should be a summary that includes the most important points in the article. The most common usage of the term is one of the most important points, therefore, it should not be left out of the introduction. I've reverted back, because that's how I hope I can persuade someone to talk about it here, and we can probably reach some kind of consensus. I refuse to discuss content by means of edit summaries. -GTBacchus^(talk) 03:06, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

Just because ignorant people think the Mason Dixon line stretches all the way to Missouri, there is no need to honor and perpetuate their ignorance. WhiskyWhiskers 02:46, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

I think your view is overly pedantic to the point of being misleading. No source that I can find asserts that the colloquial definition of the Mason-Dixon line is incorrect; each acknowledges that sense of the term and gives it some discussion. I'm happy to leave those paragraphs in a section of their own near the end, but the article is weak if the cultural significance of the line is not mentioned in the intro. I have attempted a compromise version.

It may be that many people who use the term "Mason-Dixon line" in the extended sense are ignorant of its history, but one need not be ignorant in order to allow that a culture will develop its own vocabulary, appropriating terms at will. A neologistic usage 150 years ago is standard now. -GTBacchus^(talk) 08:05, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Agree with GTBacchus; the vast majority of people who use the term do not know about the actual line, but rather the cultural line. So this belongs up front in the article. -Blauwkoe 09:09, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

WhiskeyWhiskers, please direct discussion to the talk page. I have made some changes to your version, which I am explaining here.

• "Popular usage, albeit erroneous, extends" --> "Popular usage extends"

  I challenge you to provide an authority that holds that the colloquial use of the phrase "Mason-Dixon line" to refer to the cultural boundary between North and South is erroneous. Until you do, that is an unsourced allegation, which I would say is also incorrect. See my comments above about the appropriation of terms and the evolution of language.

• In the caption on the map of the South, you changed the perfectly correct "The Mason-Dixon line forms part of the northern boundary of the shaded states", which is true in the most pedantic sense available. I changed it back, because it's correct, even according to your restricted definition.
• "The Mason-Dixon line became symbolic of the division between the "free states" and "slave states" before and during the American Civil War." This is a fact, plain and simple. The Mason-Dixon line itself - the one that you agree is the Mason-Dixon line - became symbolic of the division between slave states and free states. There are no two ways about that. If it hadn't, we wouldn't be talking about it now. Can you provide a source that the Mason-Dixon line did not become a symbol? I can provide a dozen that it did, and am ready to do so at your request.

Please reply here, so we may discuss what the article should say, and why. -GTBacchus^(talk) 04:09, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

Please, please do not use phrases like "I refuse to negotiate". This is very far from the neutral tone which Wikipedia is supposed to maintain. The fact (verifiable) that the original MDL was a surveyor's boundary does not negate the fact (verifiable) that in popular culture for well over 100 years (certainly since "Are You From Dixie" by Yellin and Cobb in 1915) the term "MDL" has been used consistently as a shorthand for the cultural divide between North and South. It may be a technical error but so are many, many other common English uses of words or terms -- these then get established. I think there's room for both of these ways -- and I think we had it about right when we said "the concept has been extended in popular culture". It's obvious this is beyond the original meaning. I don't mind talking about this, but please, "no negotiation" is what has gotten the world into a lot of trouble. "Can't we all just get along?" There should be a neutral way to express all this. -Blauwkoe 16:31, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

Well, the next step is to line up sources. It's silly to claim that the colloquial meaning of "MDL" is erroneous, in the face of a century and a half of usage. If WhiskeyWhiskers doesn't see it that way, then we need to cite authorities. It should be pretty easy, but I won't be able to work on it today. Meanwhile, very little harm is done leaving it in the current version. -GTBacchus^(talk) 20:29, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

I'm finding it hard to see how there is an argument here at all; obviously, it's a fact that the Mason-Dixon line has come to be thought of as the line dividing the North and the South. Whether or not that was the original intention is irrelevant; it has taken on that meaning now, and that's all that matters. Merriam-Webster defines Mason-Dixon line as, "the boundary line from the SW corner of Delaware N to Pennsylvania & W to approximately the SW corner of Pennsylvania & often considered the boundary between the N & S states." [1] So there you have it. It has both meanings. Kafziel 04:04, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

I think the latest edit, here, is good. Hopefully everyone is happy with that. Kafziel 05:01, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Works for me. -GTBacchus^(talk) 05:23, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Sources

• MSN Encarta, online encyclopedia. Second paragraph discusses colloquial use of "MDL" dating back to Congressional debates in 1820. Colloquial usage is not deemed to be "erroneous" or in any way incorrect.
• The Columbia Gazeteer of North America: "Before the Civil War the term “Mason-Dixon Line” popularly designated the boundary dividing the slave from the free states, and it is still used to distinguish the South from the North." Does not assert that this usage is in any way incorrect.
• a quote from Macmillan Information Now Encyclopedia "The Confederacy": "Between the Revolution and the Civil War, the line acquired additional significance as the border between Northern states that had eliminated African slavery and Southern states that retained the institution. In 1820 Missouri, west of the Mississippi River, was admitted as a slave state, with slavery prohibited in the remaining territory north of 36°30'." No assertion that the extended usage is incorrect.
• National Geographic news First paragraph: "Most Americans know the Mason-Dixon Line as the divider between North and South; freedom and slavery. But the line's origins have nothing to do with slavery and actually predate the United States." No assertion that this use is in any way incorrect.
• About.com (probably the weakest source in the lot) First sentence is similar to Nat'l Geo above; also: "[The] boundary [between free and slave states] became referred to as the Mason-Dixon line because it began in the east along the Mason-Dixon line and headed westward to the Ohio River and along the Ohio to its mouth at the Mississippi River and then west along 36 degrees 30 minutes North. The Mason-Dixon line was very symbolic in the minds of the people of the young nation struggling over slavery and the names of the two surveyors who created it will evermore be associated with that struggle and its geographic association." Not the best copy perhaps, but they're not exactly Brittannica. Oh, speaking of...
• Encyclopedia Brittannica "The term was first used in congressional debates leading to the Missouri Compromise (1820) to describe the dividing line between the slave states to its south and the free-soil states to its north. It is still used as the figurative dividing line between the North and South." Again, no assertion is made that this use is incorrect.

Ok, that's six (maybe 5 and a half) reliable sources, all documenting an extension of the term "Mason-Dixon line" to designate the boundary between free states and slave states. Every one of them acknowledges this usage continuing into modern times. Not a single one declares this use to be erroneous or in any way incorrect. Thus, User:WhiskyWhiskers' assertion that it is erroneous appears to be original research. I'll correct the article now. -GTBacchus^(talk) 18:11, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Erroneous in that it was a public perception, not an actual extension of the surveyed line. The public often has difficulty discerning fact from fiction. 24.0.91.81 05:53, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

What do you mean, "not an actual extension of the surveyed line"? Do you mean that nobody went out in the field, surveyed a longer line, and made it official in that way? Can you say what particular "fiction" you're talking about? Do you think that someone believes that... what, Mason and Dixon were called back from the dead to make the line longer? I honestly don't understand your objection. -GTBacchus^(talk) 02:56, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

I've filed an RFC on this article, by the way. See WP:RFC/HIST. I maintain that the claim that popular usage is "erroneous" is supported by nothing but an argument made by one person on this talk page (and in a handful of edit summaries). No authority on US history or geography agrees that this usage is erroneous. -GTBacchus^(talk) 03:03, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] RfC

As an editor who has a history degree, I'll offer some background. During the colonial period slavery was legal in every colony. It was relatively rare in northern colonies for economic reasons. Following independence the northern states ended slavery. Pennsylvania implemented the slowest transition and still had a handful of slaves as late as the 1820s.

The Mason-Dixon line acquired its cultural and political significance in the early nineteenth century as slavery ended everywhere north of this boundary. Hence, the Missouri Compromise debates describe what was then an emerging reality. The popular use of this term is not a corruption of some truer or purer definition. Durova 10:50, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

I have tried a sample rephrasing of the header, which I hope will be satisfactory to both sides. Septentrionalis 03:18, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Dixieland

Does the nickname 'Dixieland' come from this line? If so, should that not be referenced?

I've heard, but don't know authoritavely, that "dixie" comes from "dix" - a French unit of money common in the formerly French Louisiana territory; coincidence with "Mason-Dixon" may be noteworthy, but possibly accidental. EdK 23:26, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

Is the red line supposed to stop short of the southwest corner of Pennsylvania? Oh - now I see the bit about Native Americans stopping them. But is the part to the corner considered part of the line? If so, maybe it should be a slightly different color.

The article says that "Mason and Dixon's actual survey line began south of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and extended from a benchmark east to the Delaware River and west to what was then the boundary with western Virginia (now the state of West Virginia)." But a point 15 miles south of Philadelphia is in New Jersey, east of the Delaware River. --Nabumetone 14:15, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Because NJ was to the immediate south is why Mason and Dixon first went west before heading south to establish a suitable location for a benchmark that became known as the stargazers' stone, which still stands today near Embreeville, PA. The aforementioned source contains photos and detailed history. EdK 17:20, 12 June 2006 (UTC)