§4. The next clause prescribes the rule of apportionment. "Representatives and direct taxes shall be apportioned among the several states, 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." To the younger class of readers, this part of the clause needs explanation. §5. The convention found it very difficult to agree upon a rule of apportionment. In the first place, the states, as will be recollected, were entitled to an equal number of delegates in the old congress; and each state had one vote. But as each member of the house of representatives was to have a vote, the small states opposed a representation according to numbers, while the large states as strenuously insisted upon it. §6. In the next place, the slaveholding states claimed a representation according to numbers including slaves; the non-slaveholding states insisted on a representation according to the number of free persons. It may here be observed, that slavery then existed in all the states except Massachusetts; but as the slaves were so few in the northern states, in which slavery has been since abolished, the latter are generally spoken of as if they were at that time non-slaveholding states. The controversy on this point rose so high, and the parties were for a long time so unyielding, that fears were entertained of a sudden dissolution of the convention. §7. It became evident that the question could be settled only by compromise. The northern states consented that in ascertaining the number of persons to be taken as the basis of apportionment, three-fifths of the slaves should be added to the number of free persons. And as these states had opposed the computation of any slaves in fixing a rule of apportionment, on the ground that slaves are property, and that no property in these states entitled its owners to representation, the southern states consented, on their part, that _direct taxes_ should be apportioned on the same basis as representatives. §8. To illustrate this rule by an example: Suppose a state to contain 600,000 free persons, and 500,000 slaves. Adding three-fifths of the number of slaves, (300,000) to the number of free persons, gives 900,000 as the number of the representative population: and the state would be entitled to _three_ representatives for every _two_ that a state would have which contained 600,000 free inhabitants and no slaves. So in apportioning taxes according to population, the state in the case we have supposed, would have to raise _three_ dollars for every _two_ that it would raise if no slaves were counted.