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The Great Triumvirate

John C. Calhoun

Henry Clay

Daniel Webster

The three senators and statesmen (arranged here alphabetically) dominated American politics during theSecond Party System (1828–1852), from the start of theJohn Quincy Adams administration through theCompromise of 1850.

InU.S. politics, theGreat Triumvirate (known also as theImmortal Trio) was atriumvirate of three statesmen who dominated American politics for much of the first half of the 19th century, namelyHenry Clay ofKentucky,Daniel Webster ofMassachusetts, andJohn C. Calhoun ofSouth Carolina.^[1] These men's interactions in large part tell the story of politics under theSecond Party System. All three were extremely active in politics, served at various times asSecretary of State, as Congressmen in theHouse of Representatives and served together as Senators in theSenate.^[2][3]

Clay, the oldest, emerged on the national political scene first, serving as counsel forAaron Burr inhis treason trial and serving two short stints in the Senate before being electedSpeaker of the House of Representatives for theTwelfth Congress. Calhoun was a freshman member of this Congress and his friendship and ideological closeness with Clay helped propel him to prominence as a leader of thewar hawk faction agitating for a war which would eventually be declared as theWar of 1812. Webster was elected in 1813 toCongress and immediately became a leading anti-war and anti-administrationFederalist. Webster wrangled with the nationalists Clay and Calhoun on post-war issues such as the chartering of theSecond Bank of the United States and theTariff of 1816. After theFourteenth Congress, Calhoun becameSecretary of War and Webster declined reelection to focus on his law practice in Boston, a practice which took him before theSupreme Court in landmark cases likeDartmouth College v. Woodward,Gibbons v. Ogden, andMcCullouch v. Maryland in which he represented the Bank of the United States.

The three were reunited in the Senate in 1832, with Calhoun's resignation from thevice presidency and election to the Senate in the midst of theNullification Crisis. The three would remain in the Senate until their deaths, with exceptions for Webster and Calhoun's tenures as Secretary of State and Clay's presidential campaigns in1844 and1848. The time these three men spent in the Senate represents a time of rising political pressure in the United States, especially on the matter ofslavery. With each one representing the three major sections of the United States at that time and their respective mindsets (the Western settlers, the Northern businessmen, and the Southern slaveholders), the Great Triumvirate symbolized the opposing viewpoints of the American people and their voices in the government. The debates leading to theCompromise of 1850 were the last major contribution of the three as they were eclipsed by a new generation of political leaders likeJefferson Davis,William H. Seward, andStephen A. Douglas.

Calhoun was so ill at the time of the Senate debate on the Compromise that he was unable to deliver his fiery speech opposing it, instead having it read for him byJames Mason while he sat in the chamber. Calhoun would die just two weeks later on March 31, 1850. Within three years, Clay and Webster would die as well.^[4]

• Bourbon Triumvirate

• Merrill D. Peterson (1988).The Great Triumvirate: Webster, Clay, and Calhoun. New York:Oxford University Press.
• H. W. Brands (2018).Heirs of the Founders: The Epic Rivalry of Henry Clay, John Calhoun and Daniel Webster, the Second Generation of American Giants. Doubleday.ISBN 978-0385542531.

• Great Triumvirate
• 1810s in the United States
• 1820s in the United States
• 1830s in the United States
• 1840s in the United States
• John C. Calhoun
• Henry Clay
• Daniel Webster

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