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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote]Of course it had to do with racism. You can't count a person as only 3/5. The north didn't want them counted as people yet they are credited with restoring their status as free human beings. Do you see the irony? [/quote]

Please go read some real history about this.  The 3/5 compromise was formed long before the Civil War at the Constitutional Convention (1787).

It was a political decision.  Of course, slavery was wrong--but, this was not about trying to get rid of slavery, but how to count the slaves in the census.  Wikipedia is not always the best source, but this is a pretty simple description:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-Fifths_Compromise

Counting the slaves as 3/5 was a compromise--the Southern states wanted them counted as full--so they would get more votes.  North did not want them counted at all.  Racism was not the issue here, politics was.

You cannot change history just because it suits your political outlook.

Slavery was a despicable and horrible institution--but, when people throw around the 3/5 person argument (which does sound awful), they do not understand what the compromise was about.  It was the North that did not wanted them counted as whole--not because they did not see them as whole people, but they did not want the South to have the votes.  FWIW, women were counted as whole even though they did not get the vote--but that was true in the North and the South.

[/quote]

What are you talking about? Of course I know when it was voted on. That's why I stated founding fathers. We are not talking about how slavery was despicable. It's a generally accepted opinion of everyone. Everything about government is political. Doesn't mean there is no racism in it. Racism is often politically motivated. There is no agenda I have other than to point out that people too often are trying to judge people and actions as good of bad rather than nuanced with positives and negatives. Maybe you have an agenda to make the north look picture perfect.

I was stating that in addition to politics and money, there was racism because blacks were being discussed as 3/5 of a person. There is no 3/5 of a person without intended racism. The irony with the north is that it was the north who wanted the 3/5 of a person for political and economic reasons to have more federal representation and then of course the north and south both fought the civil war for political and economic reasons over cotton. While the common thinking of liberals today is that the civil war was over slavery. It is more nuanced. It was over cotton's prosperity to which the south thought slavery and states rights was essential for keeping that prosperity. The south kept wanting more states rights but then contradicted themselves with the Dred Scott case when they asked for federal government intervention. While the south put slavery into their declarations of seceding, this was partly their belief and partly because of political and economic reasons over cotton. The north in turn did not declare war to overturn slavery but to preserve the union which was motivated by needing the wealth of the south's economic prosperity in cotton and they kept slavery in the north throughout the entire war. Lincoln changed his mind through the course of the war to emancipate slaves, however he never emancipated the slaves in the north till after the war even though he could have. What is ironic is that the north used the thinking of blacks as inferior as a political tool to gain more northern representation in Congress when writing the constitution and then used this same view years later as a tool to motivate people to change the constitution and to get blacks to fight their battles to preserve the union.[/quote]

Oh goodness.

I'm glad you're revisionist history makes you feel better.  I guess we all are entitled to our own facts.  [/quote]

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