Question

What caused the Three Fifths Compromise

Answer 1

The delegates to the Constitutional Convention finally agreed the Three Fifths Compromise, that slaves should be counted at three fifths of their real number.

Answer 2

Answer:  The debate over how the population of states would be counted for representation in states that permitted slavery.  

Details:

At the Constitutional Convention in 1787, the Three-Fifths Compromise was a way of accounting (somewhat) for the population of slaves in states that permitted slavery.  For taxation and representation purposes, the question was whether slaves should count in the population figures.  (They were not considered voting citizens at that time.)   The Three-Fifths Compromise said that three out of every five slaves could be counted when determining a state's population size for determining how many seats that state would receive in the House of Representatives.