Explaining in Laymen's Terms the "Three-Fifths" Compromise in the Constitution

The "Three-Fifths" Compromise has become legendary in know nothing political circles of late. Frankly this just plays right into my evil little hands. Let's go for a ride as I explain this to lay persons who want to actually understand what it means , why it was adopted and how modern Americans and many "Black leader's" are playing games with this important historical compromise.

First, the "Three Fifths Compromise" IS NOT a merit judgment on the value of a black human being. Oh sure that's what progressives and Black Leaders will forward in yet another misguided effort to sway the uninformed to their side. It is an effort to disparage conservatism, the Constitution and the Founders. It is vile. It is a lie as they forward it and it is a foul effort at once again dividing Americans along racial and class lines.

The "Three Fifths Compromise" was just that - a compromise. Ya know, that thing the left is always swearing conservatives must do? The thing they swear conservatives will not do? Yeah, that BS again. It was an effort to reach an agreeable point in how population would be apportioned in the Constitution for the purposes of Congressional representation in the House of Representatives.

House seats are assigned to states based on population. In fact that is the reason - proper and accurate representational apportioning of Congressional seats by states - for the census every ten years. The census is to "reapportion" the fixed number of 435 House seats. To give more representation in the "people's House" to larger states and less influence to smaller states. The census allows for altering of the original apportioning as per Constitutional guidelines.

As House seats are based on a state's population, when it came to framing the Constitution and assigning representatives to the House, there was a real fly in the ointment. The South had a large population including the slaves owned by rich Southerners. If slaves were considered chattel as indeed they were in those days, would it be fair to all states if the South had larger representation based upon property, as slaves were in the eyes of the law, property? See the original rub?

If slaves were considered "population" for the purposes of House apportionment, the result would be an unfairly and Southern centric power base in the House of Representatives. If slaves were chattel/property, does "property" have rights under the Constitution in its original framing? No, it did not. The quandary was resolved with the Three Fifths Compromise, imperfect though it was.

The compromise decided the issue by assigning not one full person to slaves, but they were, ONLY FOR THE APPORTIONMENT OF HOUSE SEATS, considered only 3/5^th's a person when counting them. IT WAS NOT a determination that a black person was only 3/5^th's human as Black leaders and progressives love to swear today in yet another effort to defame conservatives and the Founders.

In modern parlance it was just an accounting gimmick - nothing more! It was a method to reach an agreeable compromise so both Northern and Southern states would ratify the Constitution, thus forming the original states that made up the United States in 1791.

It must be recalled that many of the early court decisions on the Federal level were to decide who was supreme - the states or the Feds. The Civil War decided the issue, but fairness and historical accuracy demands we keep in mind that up until the resolution of the Late Unpleasantness, most people were far more beholding and "loyal" to their state than to any far away entity in Washington, DC. In fact the 3/5^th's compromise was an appeasement of the states, each fighting for more representation in the US House.

Fast forward to today and what have we? Progressives and Black leaders drudging this one up in an effort to defame conservatives, the Framer's and the Constitution. It is an effort to further paint conservatives and the Constitution as in real need of change. It is an arrow in their lefty quiver to impale the political opposition upon. In terms of historical accuracy the 3/5^th's compromise is little what the left forwards it as being.

The struggle to decide House apportionment was complicated due to slavery. The compromise was one to best suit all parties. It was far from perfect and the Amendment process has corrected the disparity, EXACTLY as the Amendment process was intended to do. None of this is rocket science, unless of course one has a hopeful political ideological end - to discredit, defame and destroy the political opposition to progressivism, and that's conservatism.

Lastly, this effort by progressives and Black leaders is yet another foul, fetid and festering attempt at historical revisionism on the part of the left - nothing more! Everyone with a brain now knows slavery was bad, but in the minds of late 18^th Century persons there was no even remotely clear decision on that matter. I am not justifying slavery in any way, merely explaining it in terms of the men who settled on the 3/5^th's compromise.

Perhaps forgotten in the argument as well is the fact that the 3/5^th's compromise HELPED bring an end to slavery in America. If the South had been given the representatives in the House that counting slaves as one full person would have provided, again for accounting purposes only, it would have been a far more difficult matter to end slavery. The additional House representation in the South might have prolonged slavery by decades. Get it?

The 3/5^th's compromise was an effort, a COMPROMISE, to reach a solution to a real problem. It was not perfect, but it WAS NOT hate. It in fact led to the end of slavery. It's only HATE because the left knows unless they can discredit the Constitution, they lose the argument. Ipso facto folks, ipso facto. Are we clear now? Questions? Discussion?

SOURCES: My hard earned education

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-fifths_compromise