Is there any comparison you can make to the power brokers in the north at the time?

PROMPT: Think about how 5% of the population of the South managed to keep a system in place that was detrimental to the overwhelming majority of southerners, both black and white. What specific factor/tool/policy do you think was the key to their maintaining control and imposing their will? Why didn’t the rest of the population use their numbers to impose a system more beneficial the majority? Is there any comparison you can make to the power brokers in the north at the time? Time frame 1776 to 1790.