 Accordingly, the court used the civil-political-social distinction to formulate its conception of citizenship, and its conception licensed a hierarchical sorting of citizens by sex and race. The court’s rulings and reasoning reflected the dominant views of race and sex in American society at the time and for decades thereafter. Those views did not go unchallenged, however. Challenges were mounted by the women in the suffrage movement and by blacks, who argued that access to the ballot was needed for the effective enjoyment of the rights to property, contract and the other traditional civil rights. 