The members of the House of Representatives are reapportioned after each Census to ensure that each Representative represents approximately an equal number of voters. Since illegal immigrants cannot vote legally, it was felt they should not be included in the Census. Liberals claim that the Founding Fathers wanted everyone counted, not just voters and refer to the 1787 Compromise where they allowed slaves to be counted as three fifths for the Census. The Continental Congress was debating the apportionment of taxes for each State which was determined by population. The Northern States wanted the slaves counted as part of the population so the Southern States would pay their fair share but the Southern States didn’t want them counted in order to reduce their taxes. They finally reached a compromise where the slaves would be counted as three fifths of a person. Indians were excluded from the count until 1860 when those living off the reservations were counted and in 1900, they began counting Indians on the reservations. The Census was also used to determine seats in the House of Representatives and the electoral college The Census counted every resident except foreign nationals visiting or temporarily working in the United States. The 14th Amendment conferred citizenship on all residents born in the United States or naturalized and nothing in the Constitution precludes counting non-citizens in the Census. Apportionments for the House of Representatives is based on the total resident population of the fifty States. The total number of representatives has been set at 441. 435 from the 50 States and one from the District of Columbia and each of the five US territories. Liberals claim the illegal immigrants should be counted because they are losing population as residents flee the State and are replacing them with illegal immigrants who will vote for Democrats I return for being allowed to stay. Conservatives feel that it unfairly gives Congressional seats to liberal States and deprives legal voters of representation since the immigrants are not here legally. It was designed to give equal representation to all but it is not equal representation if two districts have the same population but one has very few voters because most are illegal and can’t vote legally.