At the Fall 2006 Executive Council Meeting in Wichita, the NFL voted 9-0 to adopt the following evidence rules and penalties for Lincoln-Douglas and Public Forum Debate:

RULE

In all rounds, debaters should, at a minimum, orally deliver title of the source and the author’s name. Complete citations for each piece of evidence introduced in the round must be available in the round. Written citations must include name of the author, qualifications, complete title of source (E.G. title of book, not chapter; title of journal, not article), and complete date. Online sources must also include the title of the site, database, or access point, the date accessed, and the web address. The additional citation required for online sources must appear on all evidence, but is not read. Should two or more quotations be used from the same source, the author and title need be given orally only for the first piece of evidence from that source. In the subsequent oral citation, only the author’s name is required.

PENALTY

Evidence lacking specified citation and challenged by the opposition shall be disregarded by the judge unless said citation is proffered immediately in the subsequent speech. At the conclusion of a challenge related to the oral presentation of or in round availability of a citation, the judge is the sole determiner of the level of penalty in the round in relationship to the level of the violation, not to exceed a maximum penalty of a loss with zero points, as part of the judge’s decision making process. However, if an evidence violation is presented where a debater is found to have committed a “serious distortion” or to have used “non-existent evidence,” at the conclusion of due process, the offending debater may be disqualified from the tournament.

The statement appears on page 21 of the November 2006 issue of The Rostrum.