Final answer:
Southern delegates wanted slaves to be counted in population totals to gain more representation in Congress, leading to the Three-Fifths Compromise.
Step-by-step explanation:
Southern delegates wanted slaves to count as people in the population because they wanted more power in Congress.
The question of slavery was a contentious issue during the Constitutional Convention. Southern states argued for enslaved individuals to be counted for representation to increase their congressional seats, yet they did not want slaves to be counted when imposing national taxes on the states.
Conversely, Northern states preferred slaves to be counted for taxation but not for representation. The Three-Fifths Compromise eventually resolved this dispute, where each slave was counted as three-fifths of a person for both determining representation and taxation, although it did not resolve the underlying moral controversies surrounding slavery.