Before the civil war, the slave owning States, were able to count their slaves for the Electoral College as well as the apportionment in congress as "three fifths of all other persons", whereas, after the conclusion of said war, since slavery had been eradicated, such a distinction of "three fifths" was eliminated, indicating that this category of people was replaced instead by "whole numbers of free persons." This would seem to be wholly positive, but the counting of such people that were formerly treated for such purposes as "three fifths" having been replaced by giving them full numerical value, ended up by being twisted in such a manner that by disenfranchising these particular people from the vote, southern States, actually picked up additional Electoral College votes, as well as an increased apportionment in congress, so that, incredibly, despite losing the civil war, the southern interests actually increased their congressional representation, because of the Constitutional reclassification of other persons to free persons. This meant, in practicality, the ruling structure of the south, with the exception of a few short years in the Reconstruction period, was for all practical purposes, the same as it had been previous to the war.
The above would imply strongly that for the south, their lost cause, was not nearly as lost as it might have appeared to have been on paper, for numerical representations does matter, and with each State getting exactly two Senators, along with the southern interests increasing their congressional apportionment, this meant, that though still outnumbered, their considerable block of votes and influence would have an outsized impact upon law making, budget allocations, and the general order of things, of which, because of this, slavery though made illegal in name, was able to continue in a revised and perverted form as in convict leasing, sharecropping, and peonage, so that, the ruling class of the south, was able to continue in its ways, especially in consideration that the federal power of the government, in the aftermath of the civil war, for the most part, did not interfere or desire to interfere with local and State laws in the south, and would not do so, until well into the 20th century.
This would also strongly suggest that congressional apportionment that simply takes into account a given resident population within a State, without taking into account their enfranchisement to vote, their citizenship status, their incarceration status, and so on and so forth, is flawed, yet it is those numbers of people that makes a material difference as to how many or how few representatives are allocated to each of the respective States, in which, quite obviously, States that have more representatives have more influence upon public policy than States that have less. So too, when certain classes, creeds, or colors of citizens are effectively disenfranchised from voting, than those that thereby become the elected representatives of such a State, are not actually representing all of the people, but are in effect, representing a portion of such, so that the public policy voted on and discussed by those representatives will favor that class of citizens that voted for them, while precluding all others.