The Slave and Trade Act was an Act that Congress wanted to pass to stop the importation of enslaved people from outside the country as a first step to limiting slavery. The South wanted to delay this for more than a decade.
The 3/5ths Clause allowed for the counting of every 5 enslaved people as 3 people for the purposes of representation in the House of Representatives.
Southern states such as Georgia and North and South Carolina refused to sign the Constitution unless the above were added to protect their slaveholding policies.
