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Books: Practical Argumentation

G >> George K. Pattee >> Practical Argumentation




The following quotations show what attitude a debater should maintain
toward his opponents:--

As I do not precisely agree in opinion with any gentleman who has
spoken, I shall take the liberty of detaining the committee for a few
moments while I offer to their attention some observations. I am
highly gratified with the temper and ability with which the discussion
has hitherto been conducted. It is honorable to the House, and, I
trust, will continue to be manifested on many future occasions. (Henry
Clay.)

Mr. President, I had occasion a few days ago to expose the utter
groundlessness of the personal charges made by the Senator from
Illinois against myself and the other signers of the Independent
Democratic Appeal. I now move to strike from this bill a statement
which I will to-day demonstrate to be without any foundation in fact
or history. I intend afterwards to move to strike out the whole clause
annulling the Missouri prohibition.

I enter into this debate, Mr. President, in no spirit of personal
unkindness. The issue is too grave and too momentous for the
indulgence of such feelings. I see the great question before me, and
that question only. (Salmon P. Chase.)

Compare the attitude of Mr. Naylor in the following quotation with the
attitude of Mr. Lincoln in his debates with Senator Douglas. It is
needless to point out which must have had the better effect upon the
audience.

The gentleman has misconceived the spirit and tendency of Northern
institutions. He is ignorant of Northern character. He has forgotten
the history of his country. Preach insurrection to the Northern
laborers! Preach insurrection to _me_! Who are the Northern
laborers? The history of your country is their history. (Charles
Naylor.)

My Fellow-Citizens: When a man hears himself somewhat misrepresented,
it provokes him--at least, I find it so with myself; but when
misrepresentation becomes very gross and palpable, it is more apt to
amuse him. The first thing I see fit to notice is the fact that Judge
Douglas alleges, after running through the history of the old
Democratic and the old Whig parties, that Judge Trumbull and myself
made an arrangement in 1854 by which I was to have the place of
General Shields in the United States Senate, and Judge Trumbull was to
have the place of Judge Douglas. Now all I have to say upon that
subject is that I think no man--not even Judge Douglas--can prove it,
because it is not true. I have no doubt he is "conscientious" in
saying it. As to those resolutions that he took such a length of time
to read, as being the platform of the Republican party in 1854, I say
I never had anything to do with them, and I think Trumbull never had.
(Abraham Lincoln in the Ottawa Joint Debate.)

Judge Douglas has told me that he heard my speeches north and my
speeches south--that he heard me at Ottawa and at Freeport in the
north, and recently at Jonesboro in the south, and that there was a
very different cast of sentiment in the speeches made at the different
points. I will not charge upon Judge Douglas that he willfully
misrepresents me, but I call upon every fair-minded man to take those
speeches and read them, and I dare him to point out any difference
between my speeches north and south. (Lincoln in the Charleston Joint
Debate.)


HOW TO JUDGE A DEBATE.

Three judges usually award the decision in a debating contest. Their
sole duty is to determine which side had the better of the argument.
Sometimes the method that they shall follow in arriving at a decision
is marked out for them; they are given printed slips indicating the
relative importance of evidence, reasoning, delivery, and the other
points that must be considered. Most commonly, however, each judge is
instructed to decide for himself what constitutes excellence in
debate. According to the rules governing any particular debate, the
judges may cast their ballots with or without previous consultation
with each other.

The following outline gives in condensed form the main points that a
judge should consider. It will be of service not only to the judges of
a debate but to the contestants, as it gives a comprehensive view of
just what is expected of a debater.

I. Which side has the better analysis?

II. Which side has the stronger proof?

A. Consider the preponderance of the evidence.

B. Consider the quality of the evidence.

C. Consider the skill used in reasoning.

III. Which side offers the better refutation?

A. See which side has the more main points left standing after
the refutation has been given.

IV. Which side has the better delivery?

A. Consider general bearing, voice, and language.




CHAPTER X

THE CONCLUSION


Most arguments have a more or less formal ending. Both writers and
speakers, when seeking to influence the beliefs and acts of others,
have usually deemed it advisable, upon completing their proof, to add
a few summarizing words and to make a final appeal to the emotions.
This part of the argument that comes at the close and that contains no
new proof is called the _conclusion_, or the _peroration_.
In spoken argument, occasionally, the conclusion is wholly ignored. If
at any time, regardless of the point he may have reached, an arguer
clearly perceives that he has won his case, he is wise to stop
immediately and avoid the danger of adding anything that might
possibly detract from his success. Such an experience may frequently
happen to a salesman, a preacher, a lawyer. Arguments, however, that
are written or that are delivered before large audiences cannot be
curtailed in this way. Under such conditions the arguer is unable to
tell when he has won his case: he must use all his proof and make it
emphatic in every way possible. Therefore the student who is arguing
for the sake of practice will do well to disregard exceptions and to
close all his arguments, both written and spoken, with a peroration.

The same two elements--conviction and persuasion--that make up the
introduction and the discussion are ordinarily found also in the
conclusion. The general principles that govern the proportionate
amount of each to be used in the first two divisions of an argument
apply equally to the third division. In every case the relative amount
of space to be devoted to conviction and to persuasion depends upon
the nature of the subject and the attitude of the audience. In some
instances a conclusion should consist wholly of conviction; in other
instances persuasion should predominate; most commonly there should be
a judicious combination of both.

In concluding an argument before the United States Supreme Court on
the question of whether or not a certain law passed in New York was
repugnant to the Constitution or consistent with it, Webster spoke as
follows:--

To recapitulate what has been said, we maintain, first, that the
Constitution, by its grants to Congress and its prohibitions on the
States, has sought to establish one uniform standard of value, or
medium of payment. Second, that, by like means, it has endeavored to
provide for one uniform mode of discharging debts when they are to be
discharged without payment. Third, that these objects are connected,
and that the first loses much of its importance, if the last, also, be
not accomplished. Fourth, that, reading the grant to Congress, and the
prohibition on the States together, the inference is strong that the
Constitution intended to confer exclusive power to pass bankrupt laws
on Congress. Fifth, that the prohibition in the tenth section reaches
to all contracts, existing or future, in the same way that the other
prohibition in the same section extends to all debts existing or
future. Sixth, that, upon any other construction, one great political
object of the Constitution will fail of its accomplishment. [Footnote:
The Case of Ogden and Saunders. Webster's Great Speeches, page 188.
Little, Brown & Co.]

In this conclusion, it will be noticed, there is no persuasion.
Apparently the subject was of such a nature that only clear and
logical reasoning was required. An appeal to the emotions would
undoubtedly have been out of place. In direct contrast to the
preceding method of summarizing a speech a good example of a
persuasive conclusion may be found in _The Dartmouth College
Case_, which Webster argued before this same tribunal, and which
also involved the constitutionality of a State law. In this peroration
Webster's emotional appeal was so strong that, it is said, there was
not a dry eye in the court room.

In writing as well as in speaking one must allow common sense to
decide what shall be the nature of his peroration. The following is a
typical example of a conclusion into which persuasion cannot well
enter. It is taken from the close of a chapter, selected at random, in
Darwin's _Structure and Distribution of Coral Reefs_.

It has, I think, been shown in this chapter, that subsidence explains
both the normal structure and the less regular forms of those two
great classes of reefs which have justly excited the astonishment of
all the naturalists who have sailed through the Pacific and Indian
oceans. The necessity, also, that a foundation should have existed at
the proper depth for the growth of the corals over certain large
areas, almost compels us to accept this theory. But further to test
its truth a crowd of questions may be asked.... These several
questions will be considered in the following chapter.

A type of conclusion far more common and usually far more effective is
one that not only refers to the preceding arguments but also contains
considerable persuasion. The peroration marks the final opportunity
for the arguer to move his audience. Here he should make his greatest
effort. Since belief and action ordinarily depend upon both the
intellect and the will, the arguer who would attain success must
appeal to both. Merely to call to mind the proof that he has advanced
is seldom enough: he must arouse the emotions. The peroration of an
argument is like the finish of a race or the last charge in a battle.
In the conclusion the arguer should use his greatest skill, his
strongest eloquence. Here are found the most inspiring passages in the
masterpieces of oratory.

Some of the various ways for reaching the emotions have been pointed
out in the chapter dealing with persuasion in the introduction. These
same suggestions apply equally well to persuasion in the conclusion.
The best advice that can be given, however, is for one to use his
common sense. He must consider his subject, his audience, his ability,
and his own interest in the case--all the circumstances in connection
with his argument--and then depend, not upon some set formula, but
upon his judgment to tell him in what way he can best be persuasive.
The following illustrations will give some idea of how successful
writers and speakers have concluded their arguments with persuasion.
Notice the patriotic appeal in the first quotation:--

Whether we have or have not degenerated compared with (say) fifty or a
hundred years ago may be a question difficult to settle, but it is
quite clear that we are pitifully, disastrously below the normal
standard of manhood and womanhood which a great nation should set
itself.

Adequate nourishment for our children, immunity from exhausting and
mechanical employments at the most critical period of adolescence, an
extension of educational influences--can there be any objects of
expenditures more likely than these to repay themselves a thousandfold
in the improved vigor and intelligence which form the only sure basis
of a nation's greatness? [Footnote: Frances E. Warwick, Fortnightly
Review, Vol. LXXIX, p. 515.]

In the following the speaker points out the awful responsibility
resting upon the jury and exhorts them to render justice:--

Let me, therefore, remind you, that though the day may soon come when
our ashes shall be scattered before the winds of heaven, the memory of
what you do cannot die. It will carry down to your posterity your
honor or your shame. In the presence, and in the name of that
everliving God, I do therefore conjure you to reflect that you have
your characters, your consciences, that you have also the character,
perhaps the ultimate destiny, of your country in your hands. In that
awful name I do conjure you to have mercy upon your country and upon
yourselves, and so to judge now as you will hereafter be judged; and I
do now submit the fate of my client, and of that country which we have
yet in common to your disposal. [Footnote: John Philpot Curran, On the
Liberty of the Press.]

In the following extract from the conclusion of Webster's plea in
_The Dartmouth College Case_ consider how he showed the magnitude
of the question that was at issue:--

The case before the court is not of ordinary importance, nor of
everyday occurrence. It affects not this college only, but every
college, and all the literary institutions of the country. They have
flourished hitherto, and have become in a high degree respectable and
useful to the community. They have all a common principle of
existence, the inviolability of their charters. It will be a
dangerous, a most dangerous experiment, to hold these institutions
subject to the rise and fall of popular parties, and the fluctuation
of political opinions. If the franchise may at any time be taken away,
or impaired, the property also may be taken away, or impaired, or its
use perverted. Benefactors will have no certainty of effecting the
object of their bounty; and learned men will be deterred from devoting
themselves to the service of such institutions, from the precarious
title of their offices. Colleges and halls will be deserted by all
better spirits, and become a theatre for the contentions of politics.
Party and faction will be cherished in the places consecrated to piety
and learning. These consequences are neither remote nor possible only.
They are certain and immediate. [Footnote: Webster's Great Speeches,
p. 23.]

As a rule, most of the criticisms that can be made of any conclusion
pertain to matters of taste and judgment. A writer or speaker may have
made too detailed or too brief a summary; he may have erred in
choosing the best method of persuasion; he may have injured his
argument in almost countless other ways. In these matters a text-book
can give only general and rather vague instruction. Each argument must
be suited to the particular case in hand. There are several common
errors in students' work, however, that should always be avoided and
that can definitely be pointed out.

1. _An argument should not have an abrupt and jerky ending_. It
is not uncommon especially in class room debate, to hear a student at
the close of his discussion say, "This is my proof; I leave the
decision to the judges"; or "Thus you see I have established my
proposition." Such an ending can in no way be called a conclusion or a
peroration.

2. _A conclusion should contain no new proof_. Violations of this
principle brand an arguer as careless, and greatly weaken his
argument. Proof is most convincing when arranged in its proper place
and in its logical order. Furthermore, the purpose of the conclusion
is to review the points that have already been established. If the
arguer forgets this fact and mixes proof with summary, the audience is
liable to become badly confused and not know what has been established
and what has not.

3. _A conclusion should not refer to a point that has not already
been established_. A careless writer or debater will sometimes
state that he has proved an argument which he has not previously
touched upon. Such a procedure smacks of trickery or ignorance, and is
sure to be disastrous. Not only will the audience throw out that
particular point, but they will be highly prejudiced against both the
arguer and his argument. It is permissible for one to maintain that he
has proved a point even though the proof be somewhat inadequate, but
for one to refer in his conclusion to a point that he then mentions
for the first time is unpardonable.

4. _A conclusion must reaffirm the proposition exactly as stated at
the beginning_. Sometimes a writer, discovering at the close of his
argument that he has not stuck to his subject but has proved something
different, or at best has proved only a part of his subject, states as
his decision a totally different proposition from that with which he
started. To illustrate, a student once attempted to argue on the
affirmative side of the proposition, "The United States should
discontinue its protective tariff policy"; but he gave as his
concluding sentence, "These facts, then, prove to you that our present
tariff duties are too high." This last sentence embodied the real
proposition which he had discussed, and if he had taken as his
subject, "Our present tariff duties are too high," his argument would
have been successful. As it was, his failure to support the
proposition with which he started rendered his whole effort worthless.

A conclusion that is weaker than the proposition is commonly called a
"qualifying conclusion." When one has fallen into this error there are
two possible ways of removing it: one is to change the whole argument
so that the conclusion will affirm the truth or falsity of the
proposition; the other is to change the proposition. In a debate, of
course, or whenever a subject is assigned, the latter method cannot be
followed.

As a final example of what a good peroration should be, consider the
following conclusion of Webster's speech, delivered in the United
States Senate, on _The Presidential Veto of the United States Bank
Bill_. Notice the skillful interweaving of conviction and
persuasion, and remember in connection with the principle of
proportion that this is the conclusion of a speech containing about
14,000 words.

"Mr. President, we have arrived at a new epoch. We are entering on
experiments, with the government and the Constitution of the country,
hitherto untried, and of fearful and appalling aspect. This message
calls us to the contemplation of a future which little resembles the
past. Its principles are at war with all that public opinion has
sustained, and all which the experience of the government has
sanctioned. It denies first principles; it contradicts truths,
hitherto received as indisputable. It denies to the judiciary the
interpretation of law, and claims to divide with Congress the power of
originating statutes. It extends the grasp of executive pretension
over every power of the government. But this is not all. It presents
the chief magistrate of the Union in the attitude of arguing away the
powers of that government over which he has been chosen to preside;
and adopting for this purpose modes of reasoning which, even under the
influence of all proper feeling towards high official station, it is
difficult to regard as respectable. It appeals to every prejudice
which may betray men into a mistaken view of their own interests, and
to every passion which may lead them to disobey the impulses of their
understanding. It urges all the specious topics of State rights and
national encroachment against that which a great majority of the
States have affirmed to be rightful, and in which all of them have
acquiesced. It sows, in an unsparing manner, the seeds of jealousy and
ill-will against that government of which its author is the official
head. It raises a cry, that liberty is in danger, at the very moment
when it puts forth claims to powers heretofore unknown and unheard of.
It affects alarm for the public freedom, when nothing endangers that
freedom so much as its own unparalleled pretences. This, even, is not
all. It manifestly seeks to inflame the poor against the rich; it
wantonly attacks whole classes of the people, for the purpose of
turning against them the prejudices and the resentment of other
classes. It is a state paper which finds no topic too exciting for its
use, no passion to inflammable for its address and its solicitation.

"Such is this message. It remains now for the people of the United
States to choose between the principles here avowed and their
government. These cannot subsist together. The one or the other must
be rejected. If the sentiments of the message shall receive general
approbation, the Constitution will have perished even earlier than the
moment which its enemies originally allowed for the termination of its
existence. It will not have survived to its fiftieth year." [Footnote:
Webster's Great Speeches, page 338.]




APPENDICES.


APPENDIX A


A WRITTEN ARGUMENT AND ITS BRIEF.

SHOULD IMMIGRATION BE RESTRICTED? [Footnote: The North American
Review, May, 1897, page 526.]

SIMON GREENLEAF CROSWELL


During recent years there has been a growing interest in plans for
further checking or limiting the tide of immigration whose waves sweep
in upon the United States almost daily in constantly increasing
volume. Several restrictive measures are already in force: paupers,
idiots, contract laborers, the Chinese, and several other classes of
people are prohibited from entering our ports. The subject has been
discussed in legislatures, in political meetings, from pulpits, in
reform clubs, and among individuals on every hand. The reason for the
interest which the subject now excites is easily found in the recent
enormous increase of immigration.

The problem divides itself at the outset into two distinct questions:
First, is it for the advantage of the United States that immigration
be further checked or limited? Second, if so, in what way should the
check or limit be applied?

It is evident that these questions cover two distinct fields of
inquiry, the industrial and the political. Nor can the two fields be
examined simultaneously, for the reasons, if there are any, from a
political point of view, why immigration should be limited, would not
apply to the questions viewed on its industrial side, and _vice
versa_.

Taking up first the industrial question, we may assume that the
entrance of the swarms of immigrants into our country represents the
introduction of just so much laboring power into the country, and we
may also assume as a self-evident proposition that the introduction of
laboring power into an undeveloped or partially developed country is
advantageous until the point is reached at which all the laborers whom
the country can support have been introduced. Adam Smith says that
labor is the wealth of nations. If this is true, the laborer is the
direct and only primary means of acquiring wealth. The facts of the
history of our country bear out this view. Beginning with the clearing
of the forests, the settlements of the villages, the cultivation of
farms, proceeding to the establishment of the lumber industries, the
cultivation of vast wheat and corn fields, the production of cotton,
the working of the coal and oil fields of Pennsylvania, the
development of the mining districts of the West, culminating in the
varied and extensive manufactures of the Eastern and Central States,
the laborer has been the Midas whose touch has turned all things to
gold.

There is, however, a limitation to the principle that the introduction
of laborers into a partially developed country is advantageous. A
point is finally reached which may be called the saturation point of
the country; that is, it has as many inhabitants as it can supply with
reasonably good food and clothing. This saturation point may be
reached many times in the history of a country, for the ratio between
the food and clothing products and the population is constantly
varying. New modes of cultivation, and the use of machinery, as well
as natural causes affecting the fertility of land, which are as yet
obscure, render a country at one time capable of supporting a much
larger number of inhabitants than at another time. Still, there is a
broad and general truth that, time and place and kind of people being
considered, some countries are over-populated, and some are under-
populated.

We are accustomed to say that some of the countries of Europe are
over-populated, and there are among us some who are beginning to say
that the United States has reached the same point. This is far from
being the case, and a single glance at the comparative average density
of population of the principal European nations and of the United
States will be sufficient to drive this idea out of any fair-minded
person's head.

The most thickly settled country of modern Europe is the Netherlands,
which had, in the year 1890, the very large average of three hundred
and fifty-nine inhabitants per square mile of territory. Great Britain
came next, with the almost equally large average of three hundred and
eleven inhabitants per square mile of territory. Germany had two
hundred and thirty-four and France one hundred and eighty-seven.
Taking in for purposes of comparison, though not of much force in the
argument, China, we find there an average population of two hundred
and ninety-five inhabitants per square mile of territory. It is a
question of some difficulty to decide in any specific case whether a
country has reached the point of over-population. We may admit that
Great Britain, with its average of three hundred and eleven
inhabitants per mile, is over-populated, though the conditions of life
do not seem to be wholly intolerable, even to the lowest classes
there. If Great Britain is over-populated, _a fortiori_ are the
Netherlands, and we may even go so far as to admit that Germany, with
its average of two hundred and thirty-four inhabitants per square
mile, is over-populated. But when we come to France, with its one
hundred and eighty-seven inhabitants per square mile, we may pause and
see what are the conditions of the French people. So far as it is
possible to judge of a people in the lump, it would seem that the
population of France is not excessive for the area. The land holdings
are divided up into very small lots, but are held by a great number of
people. Mackenzie, in his history of the nineteenth century, says that
nearly two-thirds of the French householders are landowners, while
only one British householder in every four is an owner of land. This
condition results partly from the difference in the system of
inheritance of land in the two countries, but would be impossible if
the country were over-populated. Moreover, there are five millions of
people in France whose possessions in land are under six acres each.