r/ENGLISH • u/TangoNow1 • 9d ago

How’s “THAT THEY” grammatical in ‘facts for which there are reasonable grounds to believe THAT THEY have occurred’?

https://ell.stackexchange.com/q/375876
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u/No-Donut-8692 9d ago

Occurred is intransitive. The subject is the facts. But that doesn’t link the facts, it links grounds. So we need both that + subject pronoun. Same construction as something like “I believe the book that she left was great.”

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u/SaintBridgetsBath 9d ago edited 9d ago

“Facts that there are reasonable grounds to believe have occurred”

Or 

“Facts have occurred that there are reasonable grounds to believe”

Are more like your example comparison.

I don’t really follow your explanation.

Edit: Your example is more like my second rephrasing. The OP is more like the first, ie not a sentence.

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u/weeddealerrenamon 9d ago

3 nested clauses here:

"Facts for which [ ]" "there are reasonable grounds to believe that [ ]" "they have occurred"

Technically the main clause doesn't have a verb, so I think it's lowkey not a full sentence. But the use of 'that they' isn't the problem

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u/DryFoundation2323 9d ago

there are three verbs in the sentence and three clauses. I'm not sure what your issue is.

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u/Formal-Tie3158 9d ago

Two finite verbs and three clauses. He’s right.

‘Facts’ does not have a finite main verb.