Manipulating Material
The speakers on a side should keep all their material according to some system. If cards are used, arguments to be used in the main debate might be arranged in one place, material for rebuttal in another, quotations and statistics in still another. Then if the other side introduces a point not anticipated it should be easy to find the refuting or explaining material at once to counteract its influence in the next speech, if it should be disposed of at once. If slips of paper are used, different colors might indicate different kinds of material.
Books, papers, reports, to be used should always be within available distance. While a speaker for the other side is advancing arguments the speaker who will follow him should be able to change, if necessary, his entire plan of defense or attack to meet the manœuver.
He should select from the various divisions upon the table the material he needs, and launch at once into a speech which meets squarely all the contentions advanced by his predecessor. This instantaneous commandeering of material is likely to be most usual in rebuttal, but a good debater must be able to resort to it at a second's notice