| 12：CROSS-EXAMINATION |
| http://www.sina.com.cn 2003/11/16 23:31 中图读者俱乐部 |
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第十二章质询 本章讨论了辩论当中质询阶段的各种因素。质询是指辩论双方有目的地相互问问题和回答问题的过程。本章首先探讨了质询的定义和功能，接下来研究了问问题以及回答问题时应该遵循的基本原则，并在一个具体例子中介绍了这些规则的具体应用。
Definition of Cross-examination质询的定义 Cross-examination may be defined as the purposeful asking and answering of questions about the issues in the debate during an established time format. An effective cross-examination will consist of a series of carefully-word-ed questions which establish an order, or a sequence, of ideas which help to persuade the audience that you and your statements are worthy of belief. Edward Bennett Williams, once called“the country’s hottest criminal lawyer,”gave this tough but practical advice on the most difficult of trial techniques, cross-examination: It is ...the art of putting a bridle on a witness who has been called to do you harm, and of controlling him so well that he helps you. You must think of him as a man with a knife in his hand who is out to stab you, and you must feel your way with him as if you were in a dark room together. You must move with him, roll with him. You must never explore or experiment during cross-examination. You must never ask a question if you do not already know the answer. If you do know it and the witness refuses to say what you know, you can slaughter him. Otherwise he may slaughter you. Never attack a point that is unassailable. And if you hit a telling point, try not to let the witness know it. Keep quiet and go on. The time to dramatize it to the jury is during your closing argument.
Functions of Cross-examination质询的作用 All of the considerations of argumentation and debate apply to cross-examination debate. Cross-examination mainly has the following four functions. 1. Some portions of your opponents speech may have been unclear - either by accident or design. Cross-examination affords an opportunity to clarify them. Q: Your plan calls for placing a space station in orbit. What sort of an orbit will that be? A: Geosynchronous. That way we will be able to ... Q: Thank you. That’s what I wanted to know. This brief exchange clarified the affirmative’s plan. The negative now knows that the affirmative is going to use a high orbit that will be far more costly than a low orbit and will present many technical difficulties. With the now-clarified plan before them, the negative can begin to develop plan attacks specific to the type of orbit the affirmative is now committed to using in their plan. 2. If you know of a defect in your opponents evidence, crossexamination gives you an excellent opportunity to expose it. Q: You justify your plan for greater freedom for law-enforcement agencies by claiming that crime increased 16 percent last year? A: Yes, and not only last year; it has been a steady trend. Q: And the source of your evidence was? A: The Boston Globe. Q: Andswheresdid the Globe get its figures? A: (Consulting card) From, er, let me see. From the FBI. Yes, from an FBI report. Q: From the FBI report. Thank you, we’ll come to that later. Now... The questioner has now established the source of the affirmative’s evidence. In the next speech the negative will certainly emphasize the flaw in that evidence. You may recall that the FBI had warned against using these statistics to make year-to-year comparisons. Let’s consider another example: Q: You claim industry will move to escape environmental controls? A: Right. They certainly will. Q: Would you please read that card? I think it was the ... A: State Street Report.“When faced with unreasonably high taxes and excessive regulation, industry will give serious consideration to their option to move to a location that offers a more favorable business climate.” Q: That specifically says a combination of high taxes and unreasonable regulations, doesn’t it? A: Well, er, yes, but I think the focus is ... Q: Does the evidence say that any industry moved because of environmental regulations alone? A: Er, no, I don’t think so. Not in this report, but environ-mental controls are a part of it. Q: Does the State Street Report specifically mention environmental controls? A: It cites“unreasonable regulations”and many of the ... Q: No mention of environmental controls. Thank you. And it said industry would consider moving, didn’t it? A: Yes, and they have moved. Q: Does your evidence say so? A: Well, no, not this evidence. We have other evidence that my partner will read ... Q: We’ll be looking for it in her speech. But so far there is not evidence of industry moving, no evidence about environmental controls. Thank you. This cross-examination has given the questioner an opportunity to point out important flaws in the evidence. If the respondent’s partner fails to provide the promised new evidence in her speech, the questioner’s colleague should be prepared to point that out. 3. Crossexamination may be used to advance your position. Q: You didn’t respond to our argument that unemployment will persist, did you? A: No. We give you that. This brief exchange allowed the debater to emphasize that the other team had dropped an argument. The“development of space”resolution provides another example: Q: Our evidence says that industry will make billions in the space station, doesn’t it? A: Yes, but industry is reluctant to gosintosspace. Q: You mean industry is reluctant to make billions in profits? A: No. They’re reluctant because they’re not certain that the station will be built. Q: Our plan mandates that the space station will be built, doesn’t it? A: Yes, but ... Q: And industry will certainly want those billions of dollars of profit, won’t they? A: Well, once it’s built ... Q: Thank you. 4. Crossexamination may be used to respond to an attack made on your position. Q: In your workability attack you said our plan wouldn’t work because the people in the space station would get sick. A: Right. The evidence shows they develop low blood pressure and lose bone marrow. Both Russians and Americans. And it takes three months. Q: They get low blood pressure. So what? A: Low blood pressure isn’t good for you. Q: Does the evidence say that? A: Well, no, but everybody knows that low blood pressure ... Q: The evidence doesn’t say it’s low enough to do any harm, does it? A: It says they develop low ... Q: The evidence doesn’t say it gets low enough to stop them from working, does it? A: Well, no, but everyone knows low blood pressure ... Q: No significance shows in low blood pressure. Now, about the bone marrow - so what? A: They lose 5 percent of their bone marrow, and it takes three months to get it back to normal. Both Russians and Americans. Q: Again no significance. The evidence doesn’t say that they can’t work, does it? A: It does say that it takes them three months to ... Q: And they’re back to normal. But the evidence doesn’t attach any significance to a 5 percent loss, does it? A: I certainly think it’s significant. Q: Do the physicians who made the reports say it’s significant? A: Well, what they say is ... they report ... they report low blood pressure and loss of bone marrow. Q: And in neither case do they say it’s significant. Thank you.Here the debater defended his case by establishing that the workability attack had no significance.
Rules for the Questioners提问者的规则 1. Questioners should avoid“openended”questions that allow the respondent freedom to roam at will. Q: Do you think your plan will reduce fuel consumption? A: Absolutely. The Petroleum Study proves our tax will effectively reduce consumption. The hearings prove we have the technology. The Berkeley Report says that this combination of increased taxed and already-proved technology will reduce oil imports by at least 20 percent within ... The“do you think”opening gives respondents license to say anything they want to. Of course, they think position is favorable and will use this opportunity to advance it. Lawyer and best-selling author Scott Throw admonishes.“A good trial lawyer never asks why, unless he knows the answer.”Know echoes Williamswise advice considered earlier. Like the“do you think”opening, a“why”question invites respondents to give the best possible reasons for their position. Further considerations of the questioner include: 2. Questioners should try to elicit brief responses. They may not cut off a reasonable qualification, but they may cut off a verbose response with a statement such as“Thank you, that gives us enough information”or“That’s fine, thank you. That makes your position clear.” 3. Questioners should not develop arguments on the responses obtained during crossexamination. Cross-examination is a time for asking questions and getting responses. The significance of the responses should be argued in the constructive speeches or in rebuttal. 4. Questions should be brief and easily understandable. Rambling, ambiguous questions may confuse the opponent, but they may also confuse those who render the decision. Respondents would certainly ask for a clarification of such questions, and the resultant waste of time would reduce the number of questions that could be asked. 5. Questions may set the stage for a question. For example,“You know of course, that President Bush has announced his support for...” 6. Questions should never ask a question unless they already know the answer. Remember the attorney Williams- advice given earlier. 7. Questioners should not attempt to attack unassailable points. Some of the arguments in the respondents- case will probably be so well established as to be irrefutable. Questioners should focus on the points they can carry. 8. Remember that the whole purpose of asking questions in crossexamination is to obtain information that you can use to your advantage in your next speech. On your flow sheet make notes of your questions and the responses you receive - the judge will be doing this so that you refer to them directly. Don’t assume that the significance of an opponent’s response is self-evident. Drive your point home to the audience in your nest speech. In cross-examination Gail admitted that their space station would be in geosynchronous orbit. Let’s see what that really means in terms of cost ... Roger admitted in cross-examination that their figures on increased crime came from the FBI. Now I’m going to tell you what the FBI itself said about using those figures for year-to-year comparisons ... Remember when I asked Mark about the significance of his claim that people get sick in space stations? He couldn’t give you any significance of low blood pressure. None. Again on the bone marrow - Mark couldn’t give you any significance there either. There’s no significance shown in their workability attack ...
Rules for the Respondents回答者的规则 Rules for the respondent include: 1. Respondents must keep in mind that each question is designed to destroy their case or to advance the case of their opponents. Consequently, they must constantly be on guard. 2. Respondents must answer any reasonable question. As noted earlier, however, they can refuse to give a“yes”or“no”answer and can add reasonable qualifications. Q: The report adopted the recommendations of the chemical companies, didn’t it? Yes or no. A: There were Democrats and Republicans on the committee and the report was adopted by a unanimous vote. 3. Respondents may refuse to answer ambiguous or“loaded”question. Q: Have you stopped cheating on examinations? A: I quit the same day you stopped snorting cocaine. Q: But, but, but I never snorted cocaine. A: Bingo! 4. Respondents may qualify their response. The“Yes, but ...”qualification is weak. It is better to give the qualification first and then give a direct response. Q: Do you believe that all branches of government should be responsive to the will of the people? A: I believe that the Supreme Court is responsive to the will of the people by protecting their Constitutional rights. With this important Constitutional safeguard, I would say that government should be responsive to the will of the people. 5. Respondents must answer from their perspective. Governor Mario M. Cuomo of New York provided an example of this: Reporter: Aren’t you pretty thin-skinned about that, Governor? Cuomo: If by thin-skinned you mean very, very quick to respond–that’s what I’ve done for a lifetime. I’d been a lawyer for more than twenty years. You can’t let the comment from the witness pass. If［by thinskinned］you’re talking about being personally sensitive to criticism, that’s a lot of［expletive］. 6. Respondents should promptly admit not knowing the answer to a question. Q: Do you know what methodology Kwarciany and Langer used in their study? A: They’re reputable scholars. I’m sure they used an appropriate methodology. Buy, no, I don’t know their exact methodology. 7. Respondents should not attempt to defend an indefensible point. It is better to yield a point immediately than to allow questioners to wring admissions from the respon-dents in a series of questions that will only fix the point more firmly in the minds of those who render the decision.
A Full Example for the Whole Process全过程举例 Examiner: On contentionⅡ.B, what was your supporting evidence? Respondent: We cited a study calling for federal intervention. Examiner: Was the study done by the federal government? Respondent: No, it was done by Zwgler Research. Examiner: Did the federal government commission pay Zwigler to do the study? Respondent: Well, yes, they did have a federal contract. Examiner: What was the date? Respondent: October, 1972. Examiner: Was there a presidential election that year? Respondent: Yes, I believe so. Examiner: Could money influence the results of a study? Respondent: I’m not sure what you’re getting at. Examiner: Suppose you were hired to mow somebody’s lawn, would you do it the way they wanted? Respondent: I guess so. Examiner: Is it possible such bias might creepsintosa study report as well. Respondent: I suppose it’s possible. Examiner: Was President Nixon running for reelection that year? Respondent: I don’t know. Examiner: Well, he was, and if we later introduce evidence showing he strongly favored federal intervention in this area as a theme in his campaign, are you still willing to stand by an argument whose only support is a twenty-year-old study, done at the request and support of the federal government, which exactly concludes what the incumbent wanted it to conclude and which was issued just in time for the November election? Respondent: Well, (pause) you’d have to show meswheresthere’s a problem. Examiner: Would a reasonable person at least have cause to wonder? Respondent: Well, (pause) I’m not so sure. (pause) We thought it was pretty good. Examiner: Thank you, let’s now turn to contentionⅢ. Can you restate your title of this contention for me? As you can see, the examiner set up a series of questions designed to reveal a weakness in the opposition’s case. While the respondent never admitted this weakness, most people in the audience would be impressed by the damaged credibility of the evidence and by the team that proved it, and they would be ready for subsequent refutation. |
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