American Parliamentary Debate Association Rulebook

As of the 2025-2026 Season

Table of Contents

  1. Format Overview
  2. Preparation
  3. Cases Debate
  4. Motions Debate
  5. New Material
  6. Motion & Case Types

Forward

This document contains the basic rules that govern debating on APDA. Although the league has a variety of additional norms and tournament-specific procedures, this document is designed to be a basic rulebook covering rules that should apply to all APDA tournaments. The aims of this project are to codify the existing basic rules of APDA in a centralized formal document, serve as a location where future rules the body wants to implement can be formally codified, and provide those who are new to the league and format with the information needed to begin practicing and competing in APDA-style debate.

The rulebook project is currently being worked on by Naz Soysal (Yale), Alex Gerber (W&M), and Cecilia Granda-Scott (Amherst) who can be reached with any questions or comments at the contact information below. This is intended to be a living document that adapts as APDA grows, and if you have any feedback on the contents of this document, or would like to help work on it, feel free to reach out to either of us or to anyone on the APDA Board.

Contact Information

Naz Soysal

Alex Gerber

Cecilia Grana-Scott

1 — Format Overview

The American Parliamentary Debate Association utilizes a 2 vs 2 debating format in which one team debates as the Government side, and the other team debates as the Opposition. These sides are often colloquially referred to as Gov/Opp. Each round features 4 debaters with 2 speakers per side, each of whom fulfil a specific role (called a speaker position). The Gov team consists of the Prime Minister (PM) and the Member of Government (MG). Similarly, the Opp consists of the Leader of Opposition (LO) and the Member of Opposition (MO). In all APDA rounds, each side delivers 3 speeches (making a round 6 speeches total) with the following order and timing:

  • 1.  Prime Minister Constructive (PMC)
    • Gov’s 1st speech allocated up to 7 minutes and 30 seconds.
  • 2.  Leader of Opposition Constructive (LOC)
    • Opp’s 1st speech allocated up to 8 minutes and 30 seconds.
  • 3.  Member of Government (MG)
    • Gov’s 2nd speech allocated up to 8 minutes and 30 seconds.
  • 4.  Member of Opposition (MO)
    • Opp’s 2nd speech allocated up to 8 minutes and 30 seconds.
  • 5.  Leader of Opposition Rebuttal (LOR)
    • Opp’s 3rd speech allocated up to 4 minutes and 30 seconds.
  • 6.  Prime Minister Rebbutal (PMR)
    • Gov’s 3rd speech allocated up to 5 minutes and 30 seconds.

The name of each speech indicates which speaker delivers the speech for that side. Notably, the first speakers for each side (the PM and LO) get to deliver two speeches in each round and the member speakers (the MG and MO) only get to deliver one speech. Each side receives 21 and a half minutes of speaking time per round, but the Gov team delivers both the first and last speech of each debate. One important and unique aspect of APDA is that the MO and LOR speeches occur consecutively, which gives the Opp team 13 straight minutes of speaking time right before the final Gov speech (this is known colloquially as the ‘Opp Block’). 

In APDA, speeches must occur consecutively and there is no time for extra preparation allocated to debaters once the first speech has begun. Debaters may take up to 30 seconds in-between the conclusion of the previous speech and the beginning of their speech to do basic tasks (eg: drink water, organize notes, etc.) but are expected to begin their speech in a timely manner.

Debaters may offer Points of Information (POIs) during their opponent’s speeches which can be initiated by brief verbal interruption (eg: saying “point”), raising a hand, or standing up. Unlike other parliamentary formats such as British Parliamentary, POIs are not required to be offered or accepted by either team, and judges are instructed to not reduce debater’s speaker points based on their lack of willingness to offer or accept POIs. Notably, POIs can only be offered after the 1st minute and before the 6th minute during the PMC and after the 1st minute and before the 7th minute during the LOC, MG, and MO. POIs may not be offered during rebuttal speeches and are not supposed to last for longer than 15 seconds. Before asking a POI out loud, debaters need to receive ‘acceptance’ of the POI by the speaker currently delivering their speech, but are allowed to offer multiple POIs during the allocated time.

Debaters are not allowed to communicate with anyone during their speeches beyond the delivery of their speech itself, which means they are barred from speaking to their partner or using digital communication while their allotted speech time is ongoing. Outside of their speech, partners are allowed to verbally or digitally communicate with one another provided they are not disruptive to the judge or speakers on the opposing team.

All APDA tournaments utilize one of two formats. At tournaments in the cases format, the Gov team in the debate presents their own topic and advocacy for the round. At tournaments in the motions format, all debaters in a given round debate the same topic pre-prepared and chosen by the tournament organizers. Cases tournaments allocate 15 minutes of preparation time to the Opp team to prepare for the round once a case has been presented to them. Motions tournaments give both teams 15 minutes of preparation time once the motion for that round has been released.

APDA is a format utilizing peer judging, in which debates are judged by other college students involved in the league or by alumni who once partook in APDA when they were in school. Every judge on APDA is supposed to be aware of, and adhere to, the rules found in this document—but there are other facets of round adjudication that may differ from judge to judge, given that every judge on APDA has slightly different priors and experience. APDA has a ‘paradigm project’ that lets judges upload documents outlining their idiosyncrasies and beliefs about judging. In every round, the judge will deliberate (usually around five to fifteen minutes) and then verbally deliver their RFD (reasons for decision) that aims to explain how and why they came to the call they did in the round. For every round, judges submit a ballot that includes the team that won along with the speaker points (often referred to as speaks) and ranks. Speaker points are allocated based on each debater’s argumentative contribution to the round, not stylistic or rhetorical factors. Judges must give out 4 ranks per round (each number from 1 to 4) that display how much each debater contributed to their team’s success in the round. Some tournaments allow open speaks and ranks in which the judges directly tell debaters speaks and ranks after their RFD and some tournaments are ‘closed speaks’ in which speaks and ranks are only available to debaters after the competition is over. Debaters are always allowed to opt-out of hearing their speaks and ranks if they prefer to not hear them. For more on speaks, check out the APDA ‘speaker scale’ document.

APDA competitions use digital ‘pairing’ software, most often MIT-Tab, for the administration of the tournament. These softwares keep track of all debaters and judges at a given tournament and help tournament organizers to ‘pair’ rounds (ie: figure out which teams are going to debate against which other teams and who will judge which round). Usually, tournaments will announce to all participants once pairings have been released for a given round and participants can use the above website to figure out who they are debating against, who is judging them, which side they have been assigned, and what room they have been given to debate in. Every APDA tournament has a slightly different set of rules that get contained in a tournaments tab policy, which is posted publicly for all participants to see before a tournament begins. Tournaments on APDA almost all run 5 ‘in-rounds’ (preliminary rounds that every team debates in) followed by a ‘break’ to further rounds called ‘out-rounds’ (an elimination bracket to decide the tournament’s winner). Teams at tournaments can qualify for out-rounds based on their performance in-rounds (eg: the number of in-rounds they win and the cumulative speaker points they are assigned).

2 — Preparation

At both motions and cases APDA tournaments, teams are given time to prepare before the round begins. At motions tournaments, the Gov team typically prepares their case inside of the assigned room and the Opp team prepares somewhere nearby outside the room. At cases tournaments, the Gov team remains in the room for the duration of the preparation period and the Opp is given the option to prepare in the same room as the Gov or to leave the room and prepare in a nearby space such as a hallway or lounge.

Teams must, under no circumstances, use the internet during the preparation period or while the round is ongoing. Once presented with a motion or case, debaters are not allowed to do research, utilize generative AI, or communicate with anyone that is not their partner (with the exception of tournament organizers or chief adjudicators) until the round ends. Accessing any kind of outside information while a round is ongoing is considered cheating on APDA. Usually, tournament tab policies stipulate that teams found to engage in the accessing of outside information or the use of generative AI will face consequences, such as (but not limited to) automatically losing the round with assigned speaker points and ranks of zero.

Teams are allowed to use pre-prepared materials during rounds, such as Google Drive documents containing notes and research, case files and blocks, and so on. Debaters and judges are allowed to ‘flow’ (track and take notes) during rounds in whichever ways they would prefer. Most often, APDA participants choose to flow during rounds using digital documents or spreadsheets shared with their partner or via notetaking by hand on paper.

3 — Cases Debate

The majority of APDA tournaments utilize the ‘cases’ format in which the Gov team is given the responsibility to choose and present their own topic for the debate in each round. This obligates the Gov team to provide a case statement (eg: “This house believes that the United States should pursue a significant decrease in trade with China”) and, if necessary, a case construct (sometimes referred to as a case background) that describes information needed to understand and properly debate the case statement. The Gov debaters, in both their PMC and subsequent speeches, are barred from utilizing ‘spec’ when they speak. Spec is a term referring to information so esoteric, specialized, or inaccessible that Opp debaters could not have reasonably been expected to know or understand. This means, if the Gov team would like any kind of ‘spec’ information to be part of the round, they should introduce it to their opponents and judges in the construct of their case before the round begins. Any information provided in the case construct is taken as true for that given round and can be referred to freely by all speakers throughout the round. If Opp teams feel that the Gov team has introduced spec to the round not provided in construct, they are allowed to do a ‘spec call’ in which they point out (during their own speech time) that Gov material should be discredited by a judge as it uses knowledge they should not have been expected to have.

At the beginning of a cases APDA round, the Gov team will present their case statement and (if needed) construct to their opponents and judges. This occurs off-time, which means the reading of case statement and construct does not count against Gov speech time or the 15 minutes of time Opp is allotted to prepare for the case. Once the Gov team has presented their case in full, Opp teams may take a brief moment to reread the case and then must promptly begin their preparation time. Opp is given up to 15 minutes to prepare once they have received the case for a round, but are allowed to end their own preparation period early if they would like. Once 15 minutes of time has passed, judges are obligated to end preparation time and begin the round.

Opp teams are given the ability to ask Points of Clarification (POCs) during preparation time for cases debates. POCs are questions asked to the Gov team regarding the case statement, construct, or other potentially relevant information. Opp teams can ask as many or few POCs as they wish during their allocated preparation time, but can also elect to leave the room and prepare on their own if they do not want to ask any more POCs. Gov teams are obligated to answer POCs but can answer them with statements such as “that’s up for debate” if they do not wish to further clarify on the matters the Opp team is questioning them on.

If the Opp team believes that the case presented by the Gov team is unwinnable for Opp or unfair in some way they are allowed to ‘tight call’ the case. Tight calls must be verbally initiated at the very beginning of the first Opp speech. Once a case gets tight called, the sole issue in the round becomes whether or not the case is, indeed, tight. For Opp to win, they must prove that the case was tight (eg: unwinnable or unfair in a non-tight call round) and for Gov to win they must prove the opposite (most often by explaining possible arguments the other side could have made to win the round had they not initiated a tight call).

4 — Motions Debate

Some APDA tournaments utilize the ‘motions’ format in which every team in a given round will compete on the same exact topic. Motions tournaments recruit a Chief Adjudication Panel (CAP) to write and organize topics for the tournament. When a given round at a motions tournament begins, the CAP will release the motion for that round to every team (along with a set of pairings that assign teams a specific opponent and side of the motion to defend) and then begin a timer for a 15 minute preparation team in which debaters can prepare their arguments for the round. These tournaments also allow ‘CAP clarifications’ which are questions asked to the Chief Adjudicators about the topic or motion.

Some motion types allow the Gov team the ability to present a model of their advocacy. This has to be done in the PMC (first Gov speech) and Gov teams that elect to present a model must pause time to accept questions on their model from the Opp team before the debate continues. Once the Opp team asks questions, the PMC time stops and restarts when clarifying questions end.

Motions are presumed to be fair and reasonably debatable for either side and motions cannot be tight called by either team in the round. Teams must defend the advocacy assigned to them and rounds must utilize the motion provided by the CAP for that specific round.

5 — New Material

Brand new argumentation is allowed to be introduced during any of the first four speeches in a round (PMC, LOC, MG, and MO) with no restrictions. However, the rebuttal speeches (LOR and PMR) are not allowed to introduce new argumentation to the round. The rebuttal speeches can do weighing and provide examples of previous arguments, but cannot introduce wholly new claims with wholly new logic and warranting. There is one exception to this rule, which is that the PMR is allowed to use new argumentation to reply to new arguments originating in MO, but arguments first made in the LOC and merely repeated or weighed in the MO cannot be newly responded to by the PMR.

Rules about new material are enforced by the debaters in each round through the use of  Points of Order (POOs). During either team’s rebuttal speech, the opposing team is allowed to interrupt by saying “Point of Order” out loud if they feel the opponents have just introduced new arguments in their rebuttal. Once a POO occurs, judges and debaters pause time on the current speech until the POO has been clarified. During a POO, the team that called the POO will briefly explain the material in their opponent’s speeches they believe is new, and the opponents can briefly respond by ‘defending’ the POO and explaining how or why the material is not new (either by pointing to where that material existed in a previous speech for their side or, in PMR, by explaining that they are responding to new MO material). Time resumes once this process ends, and judges can either tell teams that the POO is ‘under consideration’ to be adjudicated in the deliberation period, or can give the teams a non-binding ‘lean’ on whether or not the judge thinks the material is indeed new. There is no official limit to the number of POOs that can be called in a round.

6 — Motion & Case Types

Given a lack of specification from teams (in case construct), the following are guidelines for how each type of APDA case or motion is debated and evaluated. In motions rounds, the below rules are binding, but in cases rounds the Gov team is allowed to set a different standard for the debate when presenting their case statement and construct before the round if they so choose.

“This house believes that” (THBT)

  • Motions that start with “This house believes that [X]” are value judgement debates about the truth of the statement represented by X. Gov teams are required to argue that X is true and Opp teams must argue that X is not true. In motions rounds, Gov may not implement a model in these debates as they are not proposing a policy.

“This house believes that [X] should [Y]” (THBT)

  • Motions that start with “This house believes that [X] should [Y]” where X is an actor and Y is an action are policy motions. Even though these motions are phrased as statements of belief, Gov teams have fiat to model how X is done, and Opp teams have fiat to offer a counter-model. However, this fiat is exclusively from the perspective of the actor referred to by X, which means teams in the round may only fiat in things that the given actor has the power to do. These motions, like normal THBT motions, are about whether or not the motion is true from the perspective of a neutral observer.

“This house supports” and “This house opposes” (THS/THO)

  • Motions that start with “This house supports/opposes [X]” are debates that require teams to support or oppose X in the way it is likely to manifest in the world. The burden on Gov teams is to prove that X does, or will do, more good than harm (or vice versa for motions starting with THO) and the burden on Opp teams is to prove that X does, or will do, more harm than good (or vice versa). Neither team has fiat or the power to model/assert/dictate when, where, or how X will manifest. Instead, the debate should be evaluated based on the probable outcomes of X, as analyzed and characterized by the teams in the debate.

“This house prefers” (THP)

  • Motions that start with “This house prefers” function in the same way as other analytical debates. However, the Opp team is bound to defend the specific comparison provided by the motion. In motions phrased as “This house prefers [X] to [Y]” Opp teams are bound to defend Y being preferable to X. In motions phrased as “This house prefers [X]” Opp is bound to defend the status quo.

“This house prefers a world” (THPAW)

  • Motions that start with “This house prefers a world in which [X]” are a unique version of the THP motions described above. These motions set a burden on Gov teams to envision and argue for an alternate version of the world described in the motion. As in other THP motions, Opp teams are bound to defend the status quo or whatever comparison is given in the motion. Notably, arguments about the transition process between the status quo and the alternative world are not permissible, and debaters should use common sense to figure out when the world described in the motion likely diverged from the status quo.

“This house would” (THW)

  • Motions that start with “This house would [do X]” involve Gov teams arguing in favor of enacting a policy described by X. For these purposes, a policy is defined as any concrete course of action that Gov teams wish to convince the judge should be implemented. Such motions are about whether or not “This house” should do X, with Gov teams arguing that they should and Opp teams arguing that they should not. These debates are intended to be purely normative and do not require teams to discuss whether or not their policy is likely to be enacted in the real world or whether or not their policy is currently being enacted in the status quo in any way—those factors are irrelevant.
  • For the purposes of the debate, Gov teams have the powers of the relevant actor implied by the point of view of the motion (which could be a government, an individual, society at large, etc.) and the debate is about whether or not they should or should not do a policy or action, not whether their real world counterparts will or will not. It should be assumed that the given policy will be implemented in the manner that the Gov sets up (also known as fiat). As such, Opp can never argue in these kinds of debates that “the actor in this motion would never do this policy” or “politicians would never pass a law like this in real life” etc. Simply, the Gov team is assumed to have the power to enact the policy, and the debate is about whether or not enacting that policy would be good or bad.
  • In these kinds of policy motions, Opp teams may choose to defend the status quo or opt to propose a counter-proposition/alternative advocacy. It is never required for Opp teams to introduce a counter-proposition to the debate, but it can be strategic to do so in certain instances. If presenting a counter-proposition, Opp teams are granted the same amount of fiat power that Gov teams have, ie: the debate should assume that the counter-proposition Opp is presenting will also be implemented in the same way the Gov’s policy is assumed to be implemented. However, it is crucial to note that the Opp team’s counter-proposition policy must use the same or fewer resources as the Gov policy (eg: on the motion “This house would build a bridge from [X] to [Y]” Opp teams cannot counter-propose building ten bridges as expensive as the one bridge Gov defends just in alternate locations).

Actor Debates

Motions that start with “This house, as [X], would do [Y]” are actor motions. These kinds of motions require teams to consider the motion from the actor’s own perspective instead of merely considering what would be generically best for the world. This means debaters should focus on the given actor’s own reasoned judgement about what they ought to do in the situation described by the motion. Notably, what an actor should do is different from what an actor is probabilistically likely to do. Actor motions are not about predicting the likely behavior of an actor, but rather about what most conforms to the values, interests, and duties of the actor in question. Whilst past statements of intent help us to understand an actor’s perspective, the actor can be persuaded to follow a different path given quality argumentation from speakers in the round that explains why that path is best. In rounds of this type, debaters can conceptualize argumentation as if the actor is willing to listen to a debate and be persuaded by arguments each team makes.