Let’s look at an example– we will focus on the text in blue:
| Most experts maintain that the relationship between race and violence has to do with social conditions such as poverty and unemployment. For example, unemployed people are more likely to engage in crime, and some experts warn that the current economic crisis might already be contributing to an increase in domestic violence and to the recent spate of suicidal shooting sprees. However, the connection between crime and fluctuations in the labor market over longer periods of time is not clear. While most studies suggest that rising unemployment leads to an increase in property crimes, it seems to have a much smaller effect on violent crime. A few highly publicized tragedies notwithstanding, most violent crimes may be committed by a group of people who would be unemployed in any labor market. What most studies do find, however, is that violent crime is strongly associated with the activity of illegal drug markets, which tend to thrive in black neighborhoods.[14] A 1988 study of homicide in New York found that 40 percent were associated with drug trade–related disputes, mostly among black men.[15] So while whites and blacks may use drugs with equal frequency, blacks are more likely to be involved in the highly lucrative and dangerous business of packaging, distributing, and marketing them. The drug trade is violent because when disputes arise over prices, turf, or customers, there are no peaceful means of resolving them. Adversaries battle out such conflicts with weapons instead of lawyers. It is probably no coincidence that murder rates doubled during Prohibition in the 1920s, and fell sharply with the repeal of the Volstead Act in 1933. Similarly, murder rates doubled again during the “crack epidemic” in the 1970s and 1980s, when the drug trade became more lucrative and competitive, and more dangerous. |
Notice how this paragraph uses claim/evidence/warrant elements to make its point persuasively:
| element | text | comment |
| CLAIM: | What most studies do find, however, is that violent crime is strongly associated with the activity of illegal drug markets, which tend to thrive in black neighborhoods | Notice the use of a transition (however) to explain the logical relationship to the paragraph before the passage |
| EVIDENCE | A 1988 study of homicide in New York found that 40 percent were associated with drug trade–related disputes, mostly among black men.. | Here, the author has employed indirect quotation (defined here) and provided a citation in the form of a footnote |
| WARRANT | So while whites and blacks may use drugs with equal frequency, blacks are more likely to be involved in the highly lucrative and dangerous business of packaging, distributing, and marketing them | The warrant does NOT simply restate the evidence, it explains how the evidence is relevant to the claim. Moreover, it also connects the evidence back to the larger point of the essay here (see in the original):
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