The Three-Fifths Compromise proposed by delegates James…

August 1787 CE

The Three-Fifths Compromise proposed by delegates James Wilson and Roger Sherman is a compromise reached between delegates from southern states and those from northern states during the 1787 United States Constitutional Convention.

The debate is over whether, and if so, how, slaves will be counted when determining a state's total population for legislative representation and taxing purposes.

The issue is important, as this population number will then be used to determine the number of seats that the state will have in the United States House of Representatives for the next ten years.

The effect is to give the southern states a third more seats in Congress and a third more electoral votes than if slaves had been ignored, but fewer than if slaves and free persons had been counted equally, allowing the slaveholder interests to largely dominate the government of the United States until the Civil War.

The Convention had unanimously accepted the principle that representation in the House of Representatives will be in proportion to the relative state populations.

However, since slaves cannot vote, white leaders in slave states would thus have the benefit of increased representation in the House and the Electoral College.

Delegates opposed to slavery propose that only free inhabitants of each state be counted for apportionment purposes, while delegates supportive of slavery, on the other hand, oppose the proposal, wanting slaves to count in their actual numbers.

The compromise that is finally agreed upon—of counting "all other persons" as only three-fifths of their actual numbers—reduces the representation of the slave states relative to the original proposals, but improves it over the Northern position.

An inducement for slave states to accept the Compromise is its tie to taxation in the same ratio, so that the burden of taxation on the slave states is also reduced.

The Three-Fifths Compromise is found in Article 1, Section 2, Paragraph 3 of the United States Constitution, which reads:

Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons.

The three-fifths ratio had originated with a 1783 amendment proposed to the Articles of Confederation.

The amendment was to have changed the basis for determining the wealth of each state, and hence its tax obligations, from real estate to population, as a measure of ability to produce wealth.

The proposal by a committee of the Congress had suggested that taxes "shall be supplied by the several colonies in proportion to the number of inhabitants of every age, sex, and quality, except Indians not paying taxes".

The South had immediately objected to this formula since it would include slaves, who are viewed primarily as property, in calculating the amount of taxes to be paid.

As Thomas Jefferson wrote in his notes on the debates, the southern states would be taxed "according to their numbers and their wealth conjunctly, while the northern would be taxed on numbers only".

After proposed compromises of one-half by Benjamin Harrison of Virginia and three-fourths by several New Englanders failed to gain sufficient support, Congress had finally settled on the three-fifths ratio proposed by James Madison, but this amendment ultimately failed, falling two states short of the unanimous approval required for amending the Articles of Confederation (only New Hampshire and New York were opposed).

A contentious issue at the 1787 Constitutional Convention is whether slaves will be counted as part of the population in determining representation of the states in the Congress or will instead be considered property and, as such, not be considered for purposes of representation.

Delegates from states with a large population of slaves argue that slaves should be considered persons in determining representation, but as property if the new government were to levy taxes on the states on the basis of population.

Delegates from states where slavery has become rare argue that slaves should be included in taxation, but not in determining representation.

The proposed ratio is, however, a ready solution to the impasse that arises during the Constitutional Convention.

In this situation, the alignment of the contending forces is the reverse of what had obtained under the Articles of Confederation.

In amending the Articles, the North wants slaves to count for more than the South does because the objective is to determine taxes paid by the states to the federal government.