In U.S. politics, the Great Triumvirate (known also as the Immortal Trio) was a triumvirate of three statesmen who dominated American politics for much of the first half of the 19th century, namely Henry Clay of Kentucky, Daniel Webster of Massachusetts, and John C. Calhoun of South Carolina. These men's interactions in large part tell the story of politics under the Second Party System. All three were extremely active in politics, served at various times as Secretary of State, as Congressmen in the House of Representatives and served together as Senators in the Senate.
Clay, the oldest, emerged on the national political scene first, serving as counsel for Aaron Burr in his treason trial and serving two short stints in the Senate before being elected Speaker of the House of Representatives for the Twelfth 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 the war hawk faction agitating for a war which would eventually be declared as the War of 1812. Webster was elected in 1813 to Congress and immediately became a leading anti-war and anti-administration Federalist. Webster wrangled with the nationalists Clay and Calhoun on post-war issues such as the chartering of the Second Bank of the United States and the Tariff of 1816. After the Fourteenth Congress, Calhoun became Secretary of War and Webster declined reelection to focus on his law practice in Boston, a practice which took him before the Supreme Court in landmark cases like Dartmouth College v. Woodward, Gibbons v. Ogden, and McCullouch v. Maryland in which he represented the Bank of the United States.
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