To take another example from the brief we shall be working out in this chapter, the proposition, "Wytown should adopt the commission form of government," is not definite enough, for there are various forms of commission government, such as the Galveston plan, the Des Moines plan, and by this time a considerable variety of others; and citizens who are at all particular in their voting would want to know just which of these was proposed for their approval. The proposition, therefore, would have to be limited to, "Wytown should adopt a commission government after the Des Moines plan."
The exact form of your proposition will not always come to you at the first try. It may easily happen that you will not see the exact issue involved in the argument until you have gone some way with the processes of analysis which we shall be considering in the rest of this chapter. Always hold yourself ready to amend your proposition, if you can thereby come closer to the question.
Notebook. Enter the exact proposition which you are to argue.
Illustration. Wytown should adopt the commission form of government, in the form now in practice at Des Moines, Iowa.
1. Make three arguable propositions on the subject, "Entrance examinations for college."
2. Criticize the following propositions and amend them, if necessary, so that they might be argued with profit:
a. Freshmen should be required to keep reasonable hours.
b. The honor system should be introduced everywhere.
c. This city should do more for its boys.
d. The street railway companies in this city should be better regulated.
e. The amateur rules for college athletes are too stringent.
f. Intercollegiate football is beneficial.
19. Definition of Terms. Making a proposition definite is chiefly a process of defining terms which are found in it; but when these are defined you may still in your argument use others which also need definition. In general the definition of terms, whether in the proposition or not, implies finding out just what a term means for the present purpose. Almost every common word is used for some variety of purposes. "Commission," for example, even within the field of government, has two very different meanings:
As applied to state and national administration, the term "commission government" is used in connection with the growing practice of delegating to appointed administrative boards or commissions--the Interstate Commerce Commission, state railroad commissions, tax commissions, boards of control, etc.--the administration of certain special or specified executive functions ...From the standpoint of organization, then, "commission government," as applied to the state, connotes decentralization, the delegation and division of authority and responsibility, and the disintegration of popular control ...As applied to city administration, however, commission government has a very different meaning. In striking contrast to its use in connection with the state, it is used to designate the most concentrated and centralized type of organization which has yet appeared in the annals of representative municipal history. Under so-called commission government for cities, the entire administration of the city's affairs is placed in the hands of a small board or council--"commission"--elected at large and responsible directly to the electorate for the government of the city.[7]