Brown Debating Union
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The Brown Debating Union is a student-run debating organization at Brown University in Providence, RI. It has existed since 1824 and its many members include CNN founder Ted Turner, who was a vice-president of the Union. At its start, the organization was part of a secretive campus leadership group called Pacifica House, which hosted on-campus debates. One of its earliest competitions, in 1919, was a debate over the Volstead Act.
Eventually, the society began debating against other colleges. In a "triangular" league, Brown debated students from Williams College and Dartmouth College in policy debate. By the middle of the twentieth century, the debate program became part of the Brown University English Department. Competing on the National Debate Tournament circuit, the debate team was fairly successful. The team name changed to the one it has today while it was run by Alfred Snider, who was a debater and is currently a professor of speech at the University of Vermont.
In the 1980s, the English department stopped funding the team and they became a student organization, funded by the Undergraduate Finance Board. Without the funds to participate in costly policy debate, they participated in parliamentary debate.
The Union currently competes in debate tournaments held by the American Parliamentary Debate Association, or APDA. Their annual debate tournament takes place in the first weekend of November every year.
