Professor Paul Finkelman (now at U Tulsa Law) has a book that addresses this
issue: "Slavery and the Founders: Race and Liberty in the Age of Jefferson"

Amazon link: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0765604396/

-- 
Peter Wagner          http://www.PrisonersoftheCensus.org
pwagner@prisonpolicy.org      http://www.prisonpolicy.org
Prison Policy Initiative PO Box 127 Northampton, MA 01061


on 8/20/04 1:00 PM, RJLipkin@aol.com at RJLipkin@aol.com wrote:

National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice made the following statement:
"'And so far, said Rice, an African-American, Iraq's  postwar leaders have
not made a compromise comparable to the one by the framers  of the U.S.
Constitution, who ''made my ancestors three-fifths of a man.'''
I have  always been puzzled by claims that the original Constitution was
horrible--I'm  not saying that Rice is committed to this claim--because it
made 
Africans  three-fifths of a person. In my view, the original Constitution was
implicitly  committed to the position that  Africans were non-persons, not
even  
"three-fifths of a man." The "three-fifths" language goes to the question of
what effect should slaves have in determining state representation.  In
other words, it goes to the power of Whites, and does not attribute any real
value to Africans at all.  Is there any article of book which discusses  this
issue.  Thanks. 
Bobby


Robert Justin Lipkin
Professor of Law
Widener  University School of Law
Delaware