The Making of Arguments

by J. H. Gardiner

18. The Proposition. The first step in making the introduction to your brief is to formulate the question or proposition (the two terms are interchangeable in practice). Until you have crystallized your view of the subject into a proposition you have nothing to argue about. "Commission form of government" is a subject, but it is not arguable, for it gives you no hold either for affirming or denying. "Commission government should be adopted in Wytown," or "Commission government has improved political conditions in Des Moines," are both propositions which are arguable (though not yet specific enough), for it is possible to maintain either the affirmative or the negative of either of them.

The proposition must be single. If it be double, you have what the lawyers call "a squinting argument," that is, an argument which looks in two directions at the same time. For example, the proposition, "Commission government would be a good thing for Wytown, but the initiative and referendum are wrong in principle," involves two separate and unconnected principles, since commission government as first embodied at Galveston does not include the initiative and referendum. Many people, including those of Galveston and other places in Texas, would accept the first half of the proposition, and disagree with the second half. On the other hand, "Wytown should adopt a commission government on the Des Moines plan," would not be a double proposition, though this plan includes the initiative and referendum; for the proposition makes the issue that the plan should be adopted or rejected as a whole.

In some cases a proposition may be grammatically compound, and yet carry a single assertion. "Municipal government by commission is more economical and efficient than municipal government with a mayor and two chambers," is really a single assertion of the superiority of the commission plan of government. In this case there is no danger of getting into a split argument; but even here it is safer to reduce the proposition to one which is grammatically single, "Municipal government by commission has proved itself superior to municipal government with a mayor and two chambers." A predicate wholly single is a safeguard against meaning two assertions.

The proposition must not be so abstract or vague in terms that you do not know whether you agree or disagree with it. Macaulay summed up this difficulty in one of his speeches in Parliament:

Surely my honorable friend cannot but know that nothing is easier than to write a theme for severity, for clemency, for order, for liberty, for a contemplative life, for an active life, and so on. It was a common exercise in the ancient schools of rhetoric to make an abstract question, and to harangue first on one side and then on the other. The question, Ought popular discontents to be quieted by concession or coercion, would have been a very good subject for oratory of this kind. There is no lack of commonplaces on either side. But when we come to the real business of life, the value of these commonplaces depends entirely on the particular circumstances of the case which we are discussing. Nothing is easier than to write a treatise proving that it is lawful to resist extreme tyranny. Nothing is easier than to write a treatise setting forth the wickedness of wantonly bringing on a great society the miseries inseparable from revolution, the bloodshed, the spoliation, the anarchy. Both treatises may contain much that is true; but neither will enable us to decide whether a particular insurrection is or is not justifiable without a close examination of the facts.[⁴][!--Note--]

In other words, though the word "insurrection" seems to be plain in meaning, yet when we make it one term of a judgment of which the other term is "justifiable," we find that we do not know whether we agree or not. The terms of the proposition are so vague that there can be no meeting of minds. If we limit the subject to a specific case, insurrection in Venezuela, or insurrection in Cuba, then we have made a beginning toward making the proposition arguable. In these particular cases, however, it would probably be necessary to go further, and specify which insurrection in Venezuela or in Cuba was intended, before the average American would be prepared either to affirm or to deny. Wherever the terms of a proposition are too vague to provoke profitable discussion they must be narrowed down to a specific case which will draw forth affirmation and denial.

A common case where the vagueness of the proposition leads to difficulties in the argument is described in the following passage:

An equally common form of argument, closely allied to the argument by analogy, and equally vague, is that which is popularly known as the objection to a thin end of a wedge. We must not do this or that, it is often said, because if we did we should be logically bound to do something else which is plainly absurd or wrong. If we once begin to take a certain course there is no knowing where we shall be able to stop with any show of consistency; there would be no reason for stopping anywhere in particular, and we should be led on, step by step, into action or opinions that we all agree to call undesirable or untrue....

For it must not be forgotten that in all disputes of this kind there are two parties opposed to each other, and that what divides them is precisely their lack of agreement on the question what principle is really involved. Those who see a proposal as a thin end of a wedge always see the principle as a wider, more inclusive one, than those who make the proposal; and what gives them freedom so to see it is merely the fact that it remains indefinite.[⁵][!--Note--]

As a practical example of this confusion, consider the following extract from a speech in the United States Senate opposing the popular election of senators: