[190] Since the end of Reconstruction, conservative white Democrats (or "Bourbon Democrats") had regained power in the South, and the Republican party dwindled rapidly as their primary supporters in the region, blacks, were disenfranchised.[190] One crack in the solidly Democratic South emerged with the growth of a new party, the Readjusters, in Virginia.[191] Having won an election in that state on a platform of more education funding (for black and white schools alike) and abolition of the poll tax and the whipping post, many northern Republicans saw the Readjusters as a more viable ally in the South than the moribund southern Republican party.[191] Arthur agreed, and directed the federal patronage in Virginia through the Readjusters rather than the Republicans.[191] He followed the same pattern in other Southern states, forging coalitions with independents and Greenback Party members.[191] Some black Republicans felt betrayed by the pragmatic gambit, but others (including Frederick Douglass and ex-Senator Blanche K. Bruce) endorsed the administration's actions, as the Southern independents had more liberal racial policies than the Democrats.