Representatives from all thirteen states gathered in the Old Pennsylvania State House in Philadelphia throughout the summer of 1787 to attempt to shape the government of the newly created United States of America. These 55 delegates traveled to Pennsylvania to debate the merits of various plans for their newborn government; among the issues most hotly debated was the institution of slavery. Delegates from the South were keenly aware of the power they wielded. Their states depended on enslaved labor to fuel the massive agricultural output that made them political heavyweights; maintaining freedom around the institution of slavery was their top priority. While in the North, abolition of slavery had gained momentum. After determining that there should be a bicameral legislative branch that would include a House of Representatives with a total number of legislators based on the populations of each state, the question became how to allocate that representation. One particularly thorny aspect of the discussion was whether and how to count enslaved people when determining a state’s population, as this number would determine a state’s number of seats in the new House of Representatives. Some delegates, like Connecticut’s Roger Sherman, argued that representation should be based on the full population of a state, to include those people within the state who were enslaved. Many southerners supported this notion, but others like Pennsylvania delegate Gouverneur Morris opposed the idea, noting that southern states would be empowered to increase their importation of enslaved people to boost their power in Congress. In the end, Charles Pinckney of South Carolina proposed what he thought to be a compromise:
Using the ratio that had previously been established in an amendment to the 1781 Articles of Confederation, the delegates agreed to build out their Constitution including this plan for representation. The group also provided an additional 20 years for the importation of enslaved Africans and included the “Fugitive Slave Clause,” compelling free states to return enslaved freedom seekers to their former masters. The delegates did prohibit slavery in the Northwest Territories, and there was some hope that there would be a benefit to the federal government if enslaved people were counted thus; their states would have a higher federal tax liability than if they were not counted at all. The broader questions of whether the institution of slavery was incompatible with a nation built on the ideals of liberty and justice for all were left unresolved. The Three-Fifths Compromise, however, would prove to have an outsized impact on the nation’s history for decades to follow. It is essential to understand that, while enslaved men and women were counted as three-fifths of a person for representation purposes, they were in no way seen as three-fifths of a citizen. The early Republic had a hierarchy of rights and freedoms based on wealth, race, and gender. Landowning, and by default wealthy, white men, held the most power, and enslaved individuals the least. Neither freed nor enslaved African Americans could vote, but both groups of people were counted in the population tallies that determined how many representatives each state would receive. In states where slavery was legal, this would account for a massive boost in how their population was tallied. For example, the 1800 Census reported that Virginia had a little over 92,000 free white residents but counted more than 345,000 enslaved people in its population. While Virginia would be entitled to send representatives to Congress based on a total of nearly half a million residents, those legislators would have viewed more than three quarters of their population as another person’s legal property rather than as constituents. Congressional representation of southern states far outstripped that of their northern counterparts, and the ripple effect of that power was felt far beyond the Capitol Building. In their work The Constitution, Michael Stokes Paulsen and Luke Paulsen explain the southern political powerhouse:
In addition to their legislative power, southern states also saw an advantage in their access to the Executive branch, because that same method of accounting for population was used to determine the number of Electoral Votes allocated to each state in the Electoral College. Thirty-two of the first 36 presidents were southern slaveholders, and of course that influence extended to the judiciary, with those presidents nominating Federal and Supreme Court judges to the bench. In the election of 1800, Thomas Jefferson bumped his rival, John Adams, out of the presidency thanks to this advantage in the Electoral College. Without that southern advantage, it’s likely Jefferson would never have occupied the White House. While the founders may have believed that their “compromise” delayed the need to make a definitive decision about slavery, their actions actually further entangled the nation in the institution. Slaveholders were empowered by the support they received from Congress, doubling down on their investment in the system and buying more enslaved people to boost their wealth; Virginia alone went from a population of around 300,000 enslaved men and women in 1790 to nearly four million in 1860.
In order to continue enjoying our site, we ask that you confirm your identity as a human. Thank you very much for your cooperation.
The three-fifths compromise was an agreement reached by the state delegates at the 1787 Constitutional Convention. Under the compromise, every enslaved American would be counted as three-fifths of a person for taxation and representation purposes. This agreement gave the Southern states more electoral power than they would have had if the enslaved population had been ignored entirely.
At the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, the founders of the United States were in the process of forming a union. Delegates agreed that the representation each state received in the House of Representatives and the Electoral College would be based on population, but the issue of slavery was a sticking point between the South and the North. It benefitted Southern states to include enslaved people in their population counts, as that calculation would give them more seats in the House of Representatives and thus more political power. Delegates from Northern states, however, objected on the grounds that enslaved people could not vote, own property, or take advantage of the privileges that White men enjoyed. (None of the lawmakers called for the end of slavery, but some of the representatives did express their discomfort with it. George Mason of Virginia called for anti-slave trade laws, and Gouverneur Morris of New York called slavery “a nefarious institution.”) Ultimately, the delegates who objected to enslavement as an institution ignored their moral qualms in favor of unifying the states, thus leading to the creation of the three-fifths compromise. First introduced by James Wilson and Roger Sherman on June 11, 1787, the three-fifths compromise counted enslaved people as three-fifths of a person. This agreement meant that the Southern states got more electoral votes than if the enslaved population hadn’t been counted at all, but fewer votes than if the enslaved population had been fully counted. The text of the compromise, found in Article 1, Section 2, of the Constitution, states: “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 compromise acknowledged that slavery was a reality, but did not meaningfully address the evils of the institution. In fact, the delegates passed not only the three-fifths compromise, but also a constitutional clause that allowed enslavers to “reclaim” enslaved people who sought freedom. By characterizing them as fugitives, this clause criminalized the enslaved individuals who ran away in quest of their freedom. The three-fifths compromise had a major impact on U.S. politics for decades to come. It allowed pro-slavery states to have a disproportionate influence on the presidency, the Supreme Court, and other positions of power. It also resulted in the country having a roughly equal number of states that opposed and favored enslavement. Some historians contend that major events in U.S. history would have had opposite outcomes were it not for the three-fifths compromise, including:
Altogether, the three-fifths compromise had a detrimental impact on vulnerable populations, such as the enslaved and the nation’s Indigenous peoples. The enslavement of Black people may have been kept in check rather than allowed to spread without it, and fewer Indigenous peoples may have had their way of life upended, to tragic results, by removal policies. The three-fifths compromise allowed the states to unite, but the price was harmful government policies that continued to reverberate for generations. The 13th Amendment of 1865 effectively gutted the three-fifths compromise by outlawing the enslavement of Black people. But when the 14th Amendment was ratified in 1868, it officially repealed the three-fifths compromise. Section 2 of the amendment states that seats in the House of Representatives were to be determined based on “the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed." The repeal of the compromise gave the South more representation, since the members of the formerly enslaved Black population were now counted fully. Yet, this population continued to be denied the full benefits of citizenship. The South enacted laws such as “grandfather clauses” meant to disenfranchise Black people, even as their population gave them more influence in Congress. The additional voting power not only gave Southern states more seats in the House but more electoral votes, too. Congress members from other regions sought to reduce the South's voting power because Black people were being stripped of their voting rights there, but a 1900 proposal to do so never materialized. Ironically, this is because the South had too much representation in Congress to allow for a switch. Until as recently as the 1960s, Southern Democrats, known as Dixiecrats, continued to wield a disproportionate amount of power in Congress. This power was based in part on the Black residents, who were counted for the purposes of representation but who were prevented from voting through grandfather clauses and other laws that threatened their livelihoods and even their lives. The Dixiecrats used the power they had in Congress to block attempts to make the South a more equitable place. Eventually, however, federal legislation such as the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 would thwart their efforts. During the civil rights movement, Black Americans demanded the right to vote and ultimately became an influential voting bloc. They have helped a slew of Black political candidates get elected in the South and nationally, including the nation’s first Black president, Barack Obama, demonstrating the significance of their full representation.
|
Why would southern delegates to the constitutional convention have opposed the 3/5 compromise
Postagens relacionadas
direito autoral © 2024 estudarpara Inc.
