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The Unconditional Unionist Party was founded in 1861 in Missouri after it became clear southern states would not respect the election of Abraham Lincoln. Much of the leadership and membership of the Unconditional Unionist Party had previously been in the Constitutional Unionist Party. The party founder, Francis P. Blair, called for supporters of the Republican, Northern Democratic, and Constitutional Unionist Parties to support a new party with a strong position against secession (of the border states they represented) and for the reunification of the Union. The party had strong support among non-secessionists in the so-called border states during the Civil War. After the civil war, the party announced it was against suffrage for both former slaves and former confederates. It dissolved in 1866.