By the Equality in Forensics Contributor Team
Learn more about Equality in Forensics and our mission.
Most debate events are structured, with clear rules on how a round is structured and run. Congressional Debate is unique; it’s an event run by the student competitors, similar to how Congress is run by the Representatives or Senators for which the chamber is comprised.
<aside> <img src="/icons/star-outline_red.svg" alt="/icons/star-outline_red.svg" width="40px" /> Procedure in congressional debate roughly follows Robert’s Rules of Order.
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This doesn’t mean there aren’t rules. Just like Congress, there are specific procedures that must be followed. But instead of being able to just ‘do’ the things or them not being allowed in a round, there are processes that must be completed in order for actions to be taken.
Just some of the things that follow this Parliamentary Procedure include the election of the Presiding Officer (debate’s equivalent of the Speaker of the House), the deciding of the legislative docket, the order of speakers and questioners, and dozens of motions that range from taking a break to voting on legislation.
Judges don’t run the round, debaters do. So it’s important to understand how a round works in order to effectively participate within the round.
This resource page has an accompanying slideshow, created by Equality in Forensics Service Director C.J. Getting, a 2023 TOC Semifinalist in Congressional Debate. Check it out!
<aside> <img src="/icons/star-outline_red.svg" alt="/icons/star-outline_red.svg" width="40px" /> Most tournaments follow procedures outlined in the National Speech and Debate Association's 54-page Congressional Debate Guide. This resource works as an abridged version of that guide.
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Depending on the tournament, your round may or may not have a parliamentarian (parli). A parli is a judge, usually someone familiar with congressional debate, responsible for running the round until a Presiding Officer is elected. If you don't have a designated parli, someone will have to volunteer to serve as pro tempore (protemp), which means temporary Presiding Officer.
Technically, the Presiding Officer (PO) election is begun by the parli or protemp at the start of the round. But in reality, these elections begin before the round has started. Here, candidates write their last names on the board at the front of the room indicating that they wish to run for the position.
But after candidates have indicated their interest and all competitors and judges are present, the parli or protemp will ask to officially begin Presiding Officer (PO) elections. While rules vary depending on your circuit, the most generally accepted procedure begins with nominating any fellow competitors who have shown interest (written their name down) for the position.
Nomination procedure might go something like this:
Typical procedure for the motion : “I move to open the floor for PO nominations.” (1) Parli : “Are there any such nominations at this time?” (2) Rep. A : “I nominate the honorable Representative X.” (3) Parli : “Do you accept?” (4) Rep. X : “I humbly accept.” (5) Parli : “Are there any more nominations at this time?” Repeat steps 2-5 until all candidates are nominated Typical procedure for the motion : “I move to close the floor for PO nominations.”
Then, those who accept these nominations give short speeches about why they deserve the position. These speeches are given in reverse order. So, if the order of nominations was Representatives X, Y, and Z, then Representative Z would give their speech first, followed by Representatives Y and X.
<aside> <img src="/icons/star-outline_red.svg" alt="/icons/star-outline_red.svg" width="40px" /> If you’re interested in giving a PO election speech and running the chamber, take a look at our Presiding Officer resources page.
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For quick access, check out this slideshow on Presiding and Procedure, created by Equality in Forensics Directors Athena Tian and C.J. Getting.
From there, everyone votes and a PO is decided for the session. The election is usually conducted by the parli or protemp using secret ballots with runoff elections, so be sure to have sticky notes or pieces of paper ready.
Once a PO has been elected during the first round of debate, their first act should be to accept docket nominations. Simply, a docket is the order in which the chamber debates legislation. If you are particularly interested in debating a specific bill, you should lobby to put it towards the beginning of the docket. If there’s a bill you don’t want debated, you should encourage that bill to be placed at the end of the docket.
Typically, 2 legislative items are debated per session, although there are exceptions where 3 might be debated. So for preliminary rounds with 3 sessions, keep ideal bills within the first 6-7 legislative items, and anything else outside of that. For outrounds, work with the chamber to decide how many bills will be debated and then determine the docket based on that.
Similarly to PO, docket elections begin before the round has begun. In this case, that means working with the chamber to determine what bills are liked and have good splits and choose an order that best fits the interests of the chamber. Sometimes, the docket might even be fully decided even before its official election.
Either way, proper procedure is required for docket elections to run smoothly. Here’s what that might look like:
Typical procedure for the motion : “I move to open the floor for docket nominations.” (1) PO : “Are there any such nominations at this time?” (2) Rep. A : “I nominate docket X consisting of [list the items of the docket in order].” (3) PO : “Are there any other nominations at this time?” Repeat steps 2-3 until debaters have nominated all dockets they wish to nominate Typical procedure for the motion : “I move to close the floor for docket nominations.”
Here, secret elections are not typically used. Instead, debaters just stand up or raise their placard to indicate their vote in favor of a particular docket, eventually giving the chamber its official order of legislative items to be debated. Throughout the round, this docket can still be changed, most commonly though tabling and untabling bills, although this is uncommon.