Sundance District Qualifier

for the 2021 National Tournament

Congress: Orders of the Day/Rules

Order of the Day

1. A session is a minimum of THREE hours.

2. Election of presiding officer is with a majority vote in presence of parliamentarian by secret vote. If top vote is tied, eliminate lower vote candidates and recall vote for those remaining. A Presiding officer presides for the entirety of a session.

3. Seating Chart and precedence DOES NOT reset during a session. It DOES reset at beginning of new session. This does not apply online/virtual tournament. 

4. When more than one speaker seeks the floor, presidency shall follow the following method: 

1. Recognize students who have not spoken during the session. 

2. Recognize students who have spoken fewer times

3. Recognize students who spoke earlier (least recently)

4. Presiding officers should establish clear, fair explanations in recognition process and be consistent.

5. Speakers may yield time to the floor during the debate for questions or clarifications, but the speaker will remain in control of their three minutes.

6. Speeches are up to 3 minutes in length, but do not have to be the full time.

7. Author of legislation (or school of legislation) has authorship privilege in presentation of bill regardless of precedence. If no individual rises to give an authorship speech for a bill, then it is reverted to current precedence.

8. Two minute questioning will follow the first affirmative and first negative speech. 1 Minute questioning will follow all other aff/neg speeches.

9. PO’s should not call for motions. They should pause for those from the floor to call for motions.

10.  Amendments: must be presented to parliamentarian and presiding officer in writing with specific references to lines and clauses that change. This must be done in advance of moving to amend.

1. The parliamentarian will recommend whether the amendment is “germane”--that is, upholds the original intent of the legislation---otherwise it is is discounted. 

2. A legislator may move to amend between floor speeches. The PO will read the proposed amendment and call for a second by one third vote. 

3. Should students wish to speak on the proposed amendment, the po will recognize them per standing precedence and recency and count towards total. 

4. Simply proposing an amendment DOES NOT guarantee authorship speech and follow the 1 minute questioning rule. 

5. IF there are no speakers on the amendment, previous question is moved and chamber may vote without debating it.

11. Following the first two speeches on legislation, the presiding officer will alternately recognize affirmative and negative speakers, who will address the chamber for up to three minutes, followed by one minute of questioning by other delegates. If no one wishes to oppose the preceding speaker, the presiding officer may recognize a speaker upholding the same side. When no one seeks the floor for debate, the presiding officer may ask the chamber if they are “ready for the question,” at which point, if there is no objection, voting may commence on the legislation itself. There is no “minimum cycle” rule; however, if debate gets “one-sided,” the chamber may decide to move the previous question.

12.  All major voting shall be done with counted vote. Secret balloting is used when voting for presiding officer..

13.  Visual aids are permitted in Congressional Debate, provided they do not require electronic retrieval devices in the chamber.

14. All evidence used is subject to verification. Honesty and integrity are of utmost importance in legislative debate. Falsification or deliberate misuse of evidence may result in the legislator being suspended by tournament Officials.

15. Any concern or complaint of rule violation must be brought to the judges/Parlimentarian within the round it occurs. If privately needs to be discussed, put into the chat that you need to speak with the Parli and at the next break the Parli and Contestant can come to the Equity/Ombuds room to address the issue. If it is serious, and needs to be addressed immediately, then the individual can let the parli know and the Parli can pause the time of the session to deal with it. THIS WILL NOT COUNT IN SESSION TIME AND WILL BE ADDED ON TO THE SESSION to ensure that the three hours is met. 

16. Congressional Debate entries must rise to a point of information after a speech to formally request a copy of the evidence cited, the citation, or the original source of evidence. 

1. When requested during the point of information, the presiding officer will instruct the debater being challenged to produce the copy of the evidence, citation, or original source. The debater being challenged must produce the requested materials in a timely fashion. Should a debater feel they are not receiving the information they requested in a timely fashion, they may rise to another point of information for the presiding officer and parliamentarian to address the situation.

2.  Debaters who request the information may receive the evidence from the presiding officer within a period of two speeches. The round would not be put on hold for the request to be completed. 

1. For example, if a debater rises to a point of order after speech #4, then by the conclusion of speech #6, the requested evidence should be presented to the presiding officer. 

     C. If after reviewing the evidence in question, a debater feels that an evidence violation has occurred, they may submit a formal allegation by completing an evidence challenge form and, after making a motion to approach the chair, the debater will present the form to the presiding officer and parliamentarian.

Challenge Form

17. The File Share/chat may be used to share links to any calls for Evidence as needed. 

18.  These rules may NOT be suspended, and the PO should rule such motions out of order, except to extend questioning or allow for open chambers.