Apart from introducing direct universal suffrage in the North German Confederation, Bismarck sought to win over his left-wing opponents with many other liberalizing measures. The law concerning equal civil rights and admission to public office from 3 July 1869 was one such initiative. Its most important effect was to place Jews on an equal legal footing with Christians in the new Germany: thus one can speak of Jewish emancipation—at least in the formal sense—as dating from July 1869. This law did not suffice, however, to force recalcitrant federal states—much less ordinary citizens—to abandon regulations and prejudices that discriminated against the Jews. It also failed to defuse the brewing conflict over the role of institutionalized religion in public affairs, a conflict that soon boiled over in the form of the anti-Catholic Kulturkampf.