Constitutional Union party

I borrowed the term from the Constitutional Union Party, whose presidential platform in the election of 1860 opposed secession as a violation of the Constitution, but took no position on slavery per se.

Despite the enthusiasm, a third-party candidate has never been elected president, unless you count Abraham Lincoln’s 1860 White House victory as leader of the newly-born Republican Party, beating Democratic and Constitutional Union Party challengers.

The images long ago disintegrated, but lettering around the edge shows that the button was for John Bell and Edward Everett, Constitutional Union Party candidates in the 1860 presidential race.

As if that wasn’t enough confusion, a brand-new party had sprung into existence: the Constitutional Union Party, which nominated John Bell of Tennessee.

Lincoln won election with just 39.8 percent 0f the vote, while a fourth candidate, John Bell, won 12.6 percent as head of the short-lived Constitutional Union party, a fragmentary Whig offshoot.