Writing instructors who teach argument are familiar with the dilemma of conflicting metaphors: those who teach writing with a process approach may structure their teaching through a growth or benevolent nature metaphor, but cannot deny the tenacity of the "argument as war" metaphor. Breaking this war metaphor requires that ethics become a major consideration in teaching written argument. Stephen Toulmin's model of argument provides an alternative to Rogerian persuasion for achieving an ethical dimension in argument instruction and to classical deductive argument. A Toulmin structure, at the college level, demands a minimum of four parts: data, warrant, backing, and claim. Toulmin's model suggests that facts are constrained by the context of their field or discipline, and that one must first determine the argument field and its corresponding warrants and backing (the reasons why some facts are considered and others are not), before one can arrive at facts, or salient data. In addition to learning the Toulmin model, students must be involved in the evaluation and sorting of data into fields. Students can use this model of analysis to read and respond to arguments written by peers. Thus the act of arguing, rather than forming around the war metaphor, can form around a garden metaphor--cycles, growth, fertilization, flowering, seeding, and weeding. (An illustration of the Toulmin model is included.) (HTH)