convince a business man that a high-school education is an advantage
in business life.
4. Support the statement that football has benefited or harmed this
school, with five truthful statements that are evidence. Indicate
which ones would be most effective, if you were speaking to the
students, and which would make the strongest impression on the
faculty.
5. In the following statements of testimony, tell which ones would be
good evidence and which not. Tell why or why not in each case.
(1) X, a student, was told that unless he should point out the pupil
who had put matches on the floor, he would be expelled. X then said
that Y was guilty.
(2) James Brown, a teamster, asserts that the use of alcohol is
beneficial to all persons.
(3) John Burns, a labor leader, declares that labor unions are
beneficial to trade.
(4) F. W. McCorkle, a large manufacturer, states that labor unions
have proved beneficial to commerce.
(5) Professor Sheldon, a college president and profound student of
economics, has declared that labor unions help the trade of the
world.
(6) Henry Hawkins, a student at the Johnstown High School, asserts
that they have the best football team in the state.
(7) M. Metchnikoff, chief attendant at the Pasteur Institute, says:
"As for myself, I am convinced that alcohol is a poison." M.
Berthelot, member of the Academy of Science and Medicine, states:
"Alcohol is not a food, even though it may be a fuel."
(8) Lord Chatham, a member of the English Parliament, said, in
speaking of the Revolutionary War: "It is a struggle of free and
virtuous patriots."
6. On the basis of your answers to 5, state three conditions that
would make a man's speaking or writing weak evidence as testimony;
three that would make a man's testimony strong.
7. In Exercise 5 is (3), (4), or (5) the strongest testimony in favor
of labor unions. Why? Which is next?
8. Can you see one danger of relying on testimony alone for evidence?
LESSON VI
THE BRIEF. THE CHOICE AND USE OF EVIDENCE
I. What the brief is.
II. What the brief does.
III. Parts of the brief:
1. The introduction in which--
(1) The end desired is made clear.
(2) The issues are determined.
2. The proof, which states the issues as facts and proves them.
3. The conclusion, which is a formal summary of the proof.
IV. A specimen model brief.
V. A specimen special brief.
VI. Rules for briefing.
When a builder begins the construction of a wall, he must have the
proper material at hand. When an engineer begins the construction of a
steel bridge, he must have metal of the right forms and shapes.
Neither of these men, however, can accomplish the end which he has in
mind unless he takes this material and puts it together in the proper
way. So it is with the debater. He may have plenty of good evidence,
but he will never win unless that evidence is organized, that is, put
together in the most effective manner.
The builder, if he were building a wall of concrete, would get the
correct form by pouring the concrete into a mold. So also, there is a
mold which the debater should use in shaping his evidence. When the
evidence has been put into this form, the debater is said to have
constructed a _brief_.
In a previous lesson we saw how we might prove that John Quinn was a
dangerous man by using the evidence of a court record. If we had put
that evidence in brief-form we should have had this:
John Quinn was a dangerous man, for:
1. He was a thief, for:
(1) The Illinois state courts found him guilty of robbing a bank,
for:
a) See _Ill. Court Reports_, Vol. X., p. 83.
The brief, then, is a concise, logical outline of everything that the
speaker wishes to say to the audience.
Its purpose is to indicate in the most definite form every step
through which the hearers must be taken in order that the proposition
may at last be fully accepted by their experience.
The brief is for the debater himself. He does not show it to the
audience. It is the framework of his argument. It is the path which,
if carefully marked out, will lead to success.
Now, as we have seen, there are three principal steps in debating:
1. Making clear what you wish the audience to believe.
2. Showing the audience why the establishing of certain issues should
make them believe this.
3. Proving these issues.
The first two of these steps constitute what in the brief is called
the _Introduction_.
The third step, proving the issues, is the largest part of the brief
and is called the _Body_ or the _Proof_.
In addition to these two divisions of the brief there is a sort of
formal summary at the end called the _Conclusion_.
The skeleton of a brief then would be as follows:
INTRODUCTION
In which: (1) the desired end is made clear; (2) the issues are
determined.
PROOF
In which the issues are stated as declarations or assertions and
definite reasons are given why each one should be believed. These
reasons are in turn supported by other reasons until the assertion is
finally brought within the hearers' experience.
CONCLUSION
In which the proof is summarized.
Of course no two briefs are identical, but all must follow this
general plan. Suppose we look at what might be called a model brief.
MODEL BRIEF
Statement of proposition.
INTRODUCTION
I. Definition of terms.
II. Restatement of question in light of these terms.
III. Determination of issues.
1. Statement of what both sides admit.
2. Statement of what is irrelevant.
IV. Statement of the issues.
PROOF
I. The first issue is true, for:
1. This reason, which is true, for:
(1) This reason, for:
a) This reason.
b) This reason.
2. This reason, for:
(1) This evidence.
(2) This authority.
(3) This testimony, for:
a) See Vol. X, p. --, of report, document, magazine, or
book.
II. The second issue is true, for:
1. This reason, for:
(1) This reason.
2. This reason, for:
(1) This reason.
(2) This reason.
III. The third issue is true, for:
1. This reason, etc.
IV. The fourth issue is true, for:
1. This reason, etc.
CONCLUSION
Therefore, since we have shown: (1) that the first issue is true by
this evidence, (2) that the second issue is well founded by this
evidence; (3) that the third and fourth, etc.; we conclude that our
proposition is true.
Now, let us look at a special brief, made out in a high-school debate,
for a special subject.
The preceding is an affirmative brief and there were four issues. In
the following we have a negative brief, in which there were three
issues. Refutation is introduced near the close of the proof.
Of this we shall see more in the next lesson.
BRIEF FOR NEGATIVE
INTRA-HIGH-SCHOOL CONTESTS SHOULD BE SUBSTITUTED FOR INTER-HIGH-SCHOOL
CONTESTS IN THE HIGH SCHOOLS OF NORTHERN ILLINOIS
INTRODUCTION
I. Definition of terms.
1. Contests, ordinary competitions in:
a) Athletics.
b) Debating.
2. Intra-high-school contests (contests within each school).
3. Inter-high-school contests (contests between different high
schools).
II. Restatement of question in light of these definitions. Contests
within each high school should be substituted for contests
between high schools in Northern Illinois.
III. Determination of issues.
1. It is admitted that:
a) Inter and intra contests both exist at present in the
high schools of Northern Illinois.
b) Contest work is a desirable form of training.
c) Not all contests should be abolished.
2. Certain educators have asserted that:
a) The inter form of contests is open to abuses.
b) The intra contests would be more democratic.
c) Intra contests would be practicable.
3. Other educators disagree with these assertions.
4. The issues, then, are:
a) Are the inter contests so widely abused in the high
schools of Northern Illinois as to warrant their abolition?
b) Would the proposed plan be more democratic than the
present system?
c) Would the proposed plan work out in practice?
PROOF
I. Contests between the high schools of Northern
Illinois are not subject to such abuses as will warrant
their abolition, for:
A. If the abuses alleged against athletic contests ever
existed, they are now extinct, for:
1. The alleged danger of injury to players physically
unfit is not an existing danger, for:
(1) It has been made impossible by the rules
of the schools, for:
a) This high school requires a physician's
certificate of fitness before participation
in any athletic contest, for:
(a) Extract from athletic rulings of
school board.
b) Our opponent's high school has a similar
regulation, for:
(a) Extract from school paper of opponents.
c) The X High School has the same ruling.
d) The Y High School has the same requirement.
2. The charge that athletic contests between high
schools make the contestants poor students is
without sound basis, for:
(1) A high standard of scholarship is required of
all inter-high-school athletic contestants, for:
a) Regulations of Illinois Athletic Association.
B. The evils charged against inter-high-school debating
cannot be cured by the proposed scheme, for:
1. They are due, when they exist, not to the form
of contest, but to improper coaching, for:
(1) "Too much training," one of the evils
charged, is an example of this.
(2) Unfair use of evidence, the other evil alleged,
is simply an evil of improper coaching.
II. The proposed plan would not be so democratic as the present
system, for:
A. The present plan gives an opportunity to all students, for:
1. Its class and other intra contests give a chance to the less
proficient pupils.
2. Its inter contests afford an opportunity for the more
proficient pupils.
B. The proposed plan would deprive the more capable pupils of
desirable contests, for:
1. They can find contests strenuous enough to induce development
only by competing with similar students in other schools.
III. The proposed plan would not be practicable, for:
A. It is unsound in theory, for:
1. No pupil has a strong desire to defeat his close friends.
2. There is no desirable method of dividing the students for
competition under the proposed plan, for:
(1) Class division is unsatisfactory, for:
a) The more mature and experienced upper classes win
too easily.
(2) "Group division" is not desirable, for:
a) If the division is large, the domination of the
mature students will give no opportunity to the younger
students.
b) If the division is small, it is likely to develop
into a secret society.
B. Experience opposes the proposed plan, for:
1. College experience is against it, for:
(1) N. University tried this plan without success, for:
a) Quotation from president of N.
2. High-school experience does not indorse it, for:
(1) It is practically untried in high schools.
REFUTATION
I. The argument which the affirmative may advance, that the experience
of Shortridge High School demonstrates the success of this plan, is
without weight, for:
A. It is not applicable to this question, for:
1. The plan at Shortridge is not identical with the proposed
plan, for:
(1) Shortridge has not entirely abolished inter contests, for:
a) _School Review_, October, 1911.
2. Conditions in Shortridge differ from those in the high schools
of Northern Illinois, for:
(1) Faculty of that school has unusual efficiency in coaching,
for:
a) Extract from letter of principal.
(2) Larger number of students, for:
a) Extract from letter of principal.
CONCLUSION
Since there is no opportunity for serious abuse arising from contests
between schools, and since the adoption of contests within the schools
alone would lessen the democracy of contests as a form of education,
and since the proposed plan is impracticable in theory and has never
been put into successful operation, the negative concludes that the
substitution of intra for inter contests is not desirable in the high
schools of Northern Illinois.
From these illustrative briefs we can draw:
RULES FOR BRIEFING
The introduction should contain only such material as both sides will
admit, or, as you can show, should reasonably admit, from the
phrasing of the proposition.
Scrupulous care should be used in the numbering and lettering of all
statements and substatements.
Each issue should be a logical reason for the truth of the
proposition.
Each substatement should be a logical reason for the issue or
statement that it supports.
Each issue in the proof and each statement that has supporting
statements should be followed by the word "for."
Each reason given in support of the issues and each subreason should
be no more than a simple, complete, declarative sentence.
The word "for" should never appear as a connective between a statement
and substatement in the introduction.
The words "hence" and "therefore" should never appear in the proof of
the brief, but one should be able to read _up_ through the brief and
by substituting the word "therefore" for the word "for" in each case,
arrive at the proposition as a conclusion.
SUGGESTED EXERCISES
1. Turn to Exercise 1, in Lesson V, and carefully brief the selection
from Burke.
2. Is the following extract from a high-school student's brief correct
in form? Criticize it in regard to arrangement of ideas, and correct
it so far as is possible without using new material.
SOCCER FOOTBALL SHOULD BE ADOPTED IN THE "A" HIGH
SCHOOL AS A REGULAR BRANCH OF ATHLETIC SPORT
INTRODUCTION
I. Recent popularity of soccer.
1. In England.
2. In America.
II. Soccer a healthful game, for:
1. Develops lungs.
2. Develops all the muscles.
III. Issues.
1. Soccer is a beneficial game.
2. Would the students of "A" support soccer as a regular
sport?
PROOF
I. Soccer is a beneficial sport, for:
1. It requires much running, kicking, and dodging, both
in offensive and defensive playing, therefore--
(1) It develops muscles.
(2) It develops lungs.
2. It is played out of doors, therefore
(1) It develops lungs.
II. Students of "A" would support soccer as a regular sport, for:
1. Who has ever heard of students who would not support
soccer, baseball, basket-ball, and all other exciting
games?
3. The following is the conclusion of an argument by Edmund Burke in
which the speaker maintained that Warren Hastings should be impeached
by the House of Commons. If it had been preceded by a clear
"introduction" and convincing "proof," do you think that it would have
made an effective "conclusion"?
Therefore, it is with confidence that, ordered by the Commons:
I impeach Warren Hastings, Esquire, of high crimes and misdemeanors.
I impeach him in the name of the Commons of Great Britain, in
Parliament assembled, whose parliamentary trust he has betrayed.
I impeach him in the name of all the Commons of Great Britain, whose
national character he has dishonored.
I impeach him in the name of the people of India, whose laws,
rights, and liberties he has subverted, whose property he has
destroyed, whose country he has laid waste and desolate.
I impeach him in the name and by virtue of those eternal laws of
justice which he has violated.
I impeach him in the name of human nature itself, which he has
cruelly outraged, injured, and oppressed in both sexes, in every
age, rank, situation, and condition of life.
4. Take any one of the following propositions and without other
material than that of your own ideas, state at least two issues, and,
in correct brief form, proof for belief or unbelief.
(1) High-School Boys Should Smoke Cigarettes.
(2) No One Should Play Football without a Physician's Permission.
(3) Girls Should Participate in Athletic Games While in High School.
(4) High-School Fraternities Are Desirable.
(5) Women Should Have the Right to Vote in All Elections.
LESSON VII
THE FORENSIC
I. What the forensic is.
II. How the forensic may be developed and delivered:
1. By writing and reading from manuscript:
(1) Advantages and disadvantages.
2. By writing and committing to memory:
(1) Advantages and disadvantages.
3. By oral development from the brief:
(1) Advantages.
III. Style and gestures in the delivery of the forensic.
When the brief is finished, the material is ready to be put into its
final form. This final form is called the _forensic_.
As practically all debates are conducted by means of teams, the work
of preparing the forensic is usually divided among the members of the
team. The brief may be divided in any way, but it is desirable that
each member of the team should have one complete, logical division. So
it often happens that each member of the team develops one issue into
its final form.
The forensic is nothing but a rounding-out of the brief. The brief is
a skeleton: the forensic is that skeleton developed into a complete
literary form. Into this form the oral delivery breathes the spirit of
living ideas.
No better illustration of the brief expanded into the full forensic
need be given than that in Exercise I, Lesson V. Compare the brief
which you made of this extract from Burke with the forensic itself, a
few paragraphs of which are quoted there. Any student will find that
merely to glance through a part of this speech of Burke's is an
excellent lesson in brief-making and in the production of forensics.
First study the skeleton only--the brief--by reading the opening
sentences of each paragraph. Then see how this skeleton is built into
a forensic by the splendid rhetoric of the great British statesman.[4]
There are two ways in which the forensic may be developed from the
brief. Both have some advantages, varying with the conditions of the
debate. One is to write out every word of the forensic. When this is
done, the debater may, if he wishes, read from his manuscript to the
audience. If he does so, his chances of making a marked effect are
little better than if he spoke from the bottom of a well. The average
audience will not follow the speaker who is occupied with raveling
ideas from his paper rather than with weaving them into the minds of
his hearers.
The debater who writes his forensic may, however, learn it and deliver
it from memory. This method has some decided advantages. In every
debate the time is limited; and by writing and rewriting the ideas can
be compressed into their briefest and most definite form. Besides, the
speaker may practice upon this definite forensic to determine the
rapidity with which he must speak in order to finish his argument in
the allotted time.
At the same time this plan has several unfavorable aspects. When the
debater has prepared himself in this way, forgetting is fatal. He has
memorized words. When the words do not come he has no recourse but to
wait for memory to revive, or to look to his colleagues for help.
Again, the man who has learned his argument can give no variety to his
attack or defense. He is like a general with an immovable battery,
who, though able to hurl a terrific discharge in the one direction in
which his guns point, is powerless if the attack is made ever so
slightly on his flank. Perhaps the greatest disadvantage of this
method is that it does not give the student the best kind of training.
What he needs most in life is the ability to arrange and present ideas
rapidly, not to speak a part by rote.
It would seem, then, that this plan should be advised only when the
students are working for one formal debate, and are not preparing for
a series of class or local contests that can all be controlled by the
same instructor or critic. With beginners in oral argumentation this
method will usually make the better showing, and may therefore be
considered permissible in the case of those teams which, because of
unfamiliarity with their opponents' methods, can take no chances. This
plan of preparation is in no way harmful or dishonest, but lacks some
of the more permanent advantages of the second method.
The second method of developing the brief into the forensic is by
_oral composition_. This method demands that the debater shall _speak
extemporaneously_ from his _memorized brief_. This in no way means
that careful preparation, deliberate thought, and precise organization
are omitted. On the contrary, the formation of a brief from which a
winning forensic can be expanded requires the most studious
preparation, the keenest thought, and the most careful organization.
Neither does it mean that, as soon as the brief is formed, the
forensic can be presented. Before that step is taken, the debater who
will be successful will spend much time, not in _written_, but in
_oral_ composition.
He will study his brief until he sees that it is not merely a
succession of formal statements connected with "for's," but a series
of ideas arranged in that form because they will, if presented in that
order, bring conviction to his hearers. "Learning the brief," then,
becomes not a case of memory, but a matter of seeing--seeing what
comes next because that is the only thing that logically could come
next. When the brief is in mind, the speaker will expand it into a
forensic to an imaginary audience until he finds that he is expressing
the ideas clearly, smoothly, and readily. Pay no attention to the fact
that in the course of repeated deliveries the words will vary. Words
make little difference if the framework of ideas is the same.
This method of composing the forensic trains the mind of the student
to see the logical relationship of ideas, to acquire a command of
language, and to vary the order of ideas if necessary. In doing these
things, there are developed those qualities that are essential to all
effective speaking.
A debater's success in giving unity and coherence to his argument
depends chiefly on his method of introducing new ideas in supporting
his issues. These changes from one idea to another, or transitions, as
they are called, should always be made so that the hearer's attention
will be recalled to the assertion which the new idea is intended to
support. Suppose we have made this assertion: "Contests within schools
are more desirable than contests between schools." We are planning to
support this by proving: first, that the contests between schools are
very much abused; second, that the proposed plan will be more
democratic; and third, that the proposed plan will work well in
practice. In supporting these issues, we should, of course, present a
great deal of material. When we are ready to change from the first
supporting idea to the second, we must make that change in such a way
that our hearers will know that we are planning to prove the second
main point of our contention. But this is not enough. We must make
that change so that they will be definitely reminded of what we have
already proved. The same thing will hold true when we change to the
third contention.
The following illustrates a faulty method of transition: Contests
between schools are so abused that they should be abolished [followed
by all the supporting material]. The proposed plan will be more
democratic than the present [followed by its support]. The proposed
plan would work well in practice [followed by its support]. No matter
how thoroughly we might prove each of these, they would impress the
audience as standing alone; they would show no coherence, no
connection with one another. The following would be a better method:
Contests within schools should be substituted for those between
schools because contests between schools are open to abuses so great
as to warrant their abolition [followed by its support]. We should
then begin to prove the second issue in this way: But not only are
contests between schools so open to abuse that they should be
abolished, but they are less desirable than contests within schools
for they are less democratic. [This will then be followed with the
support of the second issue.] The transition to the third issue should
be made in this way: Now, honorable judges, we have shown you that
contests between schools are not worthy of continuance; we have shown
you that the plan which we propose will be better in its democracy
than the system at present in vogue; we now propose to complete our
argument by showing you that our plan will work well in practice.
[This would then be followed with the proper supporting material.]