The Conservative Democrats of the post-Reconstruction era were generally

a. wealthy white men in favor of railroads and industrial development.

b. poor to middling white men in favor of restoring the South's traditional racial hierarchy and agricultural character.

c. wealthy white men who sided with Republicans in a vain attempt to preserve black southerners' political and civil rights.

d. poor to middling white men who continued to agitate for the secession of the southern states from the Union.