Answer:
The three-fifths commitment represented the possibility of counting or not the number of slaves together with the number of free people to determine the distribution of taxes and the number of deputies for each state in the United States House of Representatives.
Step-by-step explanation:
There was a discrepancy in the opinion of northern and southern citizens about how the counting of inhabitants for each state should be to determine the collection of taxes and the number of representatives. States with the smallest number of citizens would have a milder tax collection, but would have a smaller number of representatives.
The divergence of opinion between southerners and northerners was whether slaves should be counted or not. While northerners claimed that slaves should not be counted, since they were not citizens, southern states stated that they should be counted, as they were part of the state.
This divergence was resolved with the Three-Fifths Commitment, where it was decided that slaves would be counted, but the number of slaves would be reduced to three-fifths and then added to the number of free citizens in each state, the result would be used to determine the distribution of taxes and the number of deputies of each state in the House of Representatives.