Step 1: Choose Your Partner/Opponent and Your Topic
While policy debate pits pairs of debaters against each other, L-D Debate is a one-on-one debate.
Your first step is to choose the person against whom you want to debate. Together, you will then choose your debate topic.
Your first step is to choose the person against whom you want to debate. Together, you will then choose your debate topic.
Debate TopicsThe following topics are taken from the Deliberating in a Democracy program which is part of the Constitutional Rights Foundation. The attached files include background, arguments, and research for both sides of the issue.
Additional topics, not taken from Deliberating in a Democracy, appear further down the page. |
Resolved: Internet ought to be blocked to protect national security.
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Resolved: Therapeutic cloning of human cells ought to be permitted.
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Resolved: Voting ought to be compulsory.
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Resolved: A curfew ought to be imposed on people under age 18.
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Resolved: Our democracy ought to allow schools to punish students for off-campus cyberbullying.
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Resolved: Our democracy ought to require health care providers to report domestic abuse to the police.
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Resolved: In a democratic society, judges ought to be elected.
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Resolved: Our democracy ought to fund elementary education for children of
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Elem School in Native Language | |
File Size: | 399 kb |
File Type: |
Resolved: Our democracy ought to permit physicians to assist in a patient’s suicide.
Euthanasia | |
File Size: | 468 kb |
File Type: |
Resolved: Our democracy ought to adopt a cap-and-trade system to limit greenhouse gas
emissions.
Green House Gas Emissions | |
File Size: | 441 kb |
File Type: |
Resolved: The United States ought to have a guest worker
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Guest Worker Program | |
File Size: | 414 kb |
File Type: |
Resolved: In a democratic, hate speech ought to be permitted.
Hate Speech | |
File Size: | 437 kb |
File Type: |
Resolved: Our democracy ought to require manufacturers to recycle their products.
Manufacturer Recycling | |
File Size: | 449 kb |
File Type: |
Resolved: Citizens in our democracy ought to participate in one year of mandatory national service.
National Year of Service | |
File Size: | 133 kb |
File Type: |
Resolved: In the United States criminal justice system, parents ought to be held responsible when their teenagers commit
minor offenses.
Parental Responsibility | |
File Size: | 464 kb |
File Type: |
Resolved: In our democracy, unauthorized public demonstrations ought to be prohibited.
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Resolved: The United States criminal justice system ought to require law enforcement officials to get
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Public Video Surveillence | |
File Size: | 380 kb |
File Type: |
Resolved: The cultivation of genetically modified foods ought to be allowed.
gmo_foods.pdf | |
File Size: | 361 kb |
File Type: |
Resolved: In the United States, legal foreign workers ought to have the same labor rights as citizens.
workers_rights.pdf | |
File Size: | 314 kb |
File Type: |
Resolved: Our democracy ought to require schools to provide sex education programs that include contraceptive education.
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Resolved: The United States criminal justice system ought to punish violent juvenile offenders be punished as adults.
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Resolved: The United States criminal justice system ought to place criminal penalties on anyone who sells, rents, or shows violent video games to minors.
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Resolved: The United States ought to lover the voting age to 16?
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Additional Lincoln-Douglas Debate Topics
- Resolved: The United States ought to provide a universal basic income.
- Resolved: Plea bargaining ought to be abolished in the United States criminal justice system.
- Resolved: The United States ought to guarantee the right to housing.
- Resolved: Public colleges and universities in the United States ought not restrict any constitutionally protected speech.
- Resolved: Countries ought to prohibit the production of nuclear power.
- Resolved: In the United States, private ownership of handguns ought to be banned.
- Resolved: In the United States criminal justice system, jury nullification ought to be used in the face of perceived injustice.
- Resolved: Adolescents ought to have the right to make autonomous medical choices.
- Resolved: Just governments ought to require that employers pay a living wage.
- Resolved: Rehabilitation ought to be valued above retribution in the United States criminal justice system.
- Resolved: The United States ought to guarantee universal health care for its citizens.
- The United States ought to extend to non-citizens accused of terrorism the same constitutional due process protections it grants to citizens.
- Resolved: It is morally permissible for victims to use deadly force as a deliberate response to repeated domestic violence.
- Resolved: Individuals have a moral obligation to assist people in need.
- Resolved: Justice requires the recognition of animal rights.
- Resolved: The abuse of illegal drugs ought to be treated as a matter of public health, not of criminal justice.
- Resolved: Public health concerns justify compulsory immunization.
- Resolved: Public high school students in the United States ought not be required to pass standardized exit exams to graduate.
- Resolved: In a democratic society, felons ought to retain the right to vote.
- Resolved: That secondary education in America should value the fine arts over athletics.
- Resolved: Hate crime enhancements are unjust in the United States.
- Resolved: In the United States, plea-bargaining in exchange for testimony is unjust.
- Resolved: A just society ought not use the death penalty as a form of punishment.
- Resolved: discriminations made by society on the basis of chronological age alone are justified.
- Resolved: capitalism is superior to socialism as a means of achieving economic justice.