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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Maui" data-source="post: 3133213" data-attributes="member: 45037">No it wasn't, at least not in the sense you describe. It was meant to get some credit for the human beings that slaveholders held as property for the basis of population. Virginia was the most populous state, but only when counting the enslaved. The framers needed Virginia to ratify the Constitution and worked out a deal, but would only count some humans as 3/5ths of a person. Of course, even as 3/5ths slaves held no voting rights and those were passed along to the white aristocrats that wanted to preserve their power (and keep slaves). Virginia would not be the "mother of Presidents" without this combo of laws and the bigotry they were built upon.</blockquote>