Luther Martin was born near New Brunswick, New Jersey. The date of his birth is generally given as February 8 in others as February 20, and in some accounts is assigned to the year 1744. There is uncertainty also about the names of his parents, but it is probable that he was the third in a family of nine children of Benjamin Martin, a farmer, and his wife Hannah. His ancestors, who were of English stock, had been farmers in America for several generations.
After attending the grammar school of the College of New Jersey (now Princeton University), he entered the college in 1762 and was graduated with honors in 1766.
He went to Maryland to seek a position as teacher, and obtained a school at Queenstown, Queen Anne's County. Among his pupils were the children of Solomon Wright, a lawyer, in whose home he became a frequent visitor and whose library he was permitted to use. In 1769, after teaching nearly three years at Queenstown, Martin gave up his position and left for Somerset County, Md. , to devote a year to the study of law with friends there. Shortly afterward, while making a brief visit in Queen Anne's County, he was served with five writs of attachment for debts; but Wright, acting as his attorney, succeeded in striking off the writs in the spring of 1770. In the summer of that year Martin left Somerset County to become superintendent of the grammar school at Onancock, Accomac County, Va. Here he served one year, continuing the study of law in the meantime. In 1771 he applied at Williamsburg for admission to the Virginia bar, was accepted, and in September qualified as an attorney in Accomac County. After practising a short time in Virginia, he decided to settle in Somerset County, Md. , where his practice was lucrative until the outbreak of the Revolution. In the fall of 1774 Martin was named on the patriot committee of Somerset County, and in December was a delegate to the convention of the Province of Maryland at Annapolis. In 1777 he published a reply to the appeal issued from the British fleet by Lord Howe; and his address, To the Inhabitants of the Peninsula between the Delaware River and the Chesapeake to the Southward of the British Lines, was circulated in handbills. On February 11, 1778, Martin was appointed by Gov. Thomas Johnson, upon the recommendation of Samuel Chase, as attorney-general of Maryland; and qualifying on May 20 he took up his residence in Baltimore. During the remaining years of the war he prosecuted the Loyalists with great vigor. In 1785 he was a delegate to the Continental Congress. He was also a delegate to the Federal Convention at Philadelphia, where he opposed the plan of a strong central government. Before the convention was over, he walked out with John Francis Mercer and returned home without signing the Constitution. He assailed the proposed form of government before the Maryland House of Delegates in 1787 in a speech which attracted wide attention. In 1788, as a member of the Maryland convention, he made a futile effort to prevent the ratification of the federal Constitution. Martin, now allied with the Federalist party because of his hatred of Jefferson, went to the aid of Justice Samuel Chase in the impeachment trial before the United States Senate in 1804. In 1805, after twenty-seven years of service, he resigned as attorney-general of Maryland. In 1807 he was one of the lawyers who came to the rescue of Aaron Burr at his trial for treason in Richmond, where he attacked the Administration with so much bitterness that President Jefferson in a letter dated June 19, 1807, wrote to George Hay, United States district attorney for Virginia: "Shall we move to commit Luther Martin, as particeps criminis with Burr Graybell will fix upon his misprision of treason at least. And at any rate, his evidence will put down this unprincipled & impudent federal bull-dog, and add another proof that the most clamorous defenders of Burr are all his accomplices". After the trial, Burr, and Harman Blennerhassett were entertained by Martin in Baltimore; a mob threatened to do violence; but Martin's house was guarded by the police, and the mob spent the force of its indignation on the hanging of effigies. In 1813 Martin became chief judge of the court of oyer and terminer for the City and County of Baltimore and served in this office until the tribunal was abolished in 1816. In February 1818, forty years after the date of his first appointment, he was reappointed attorney-general of the state. His last important case was McCulloch vs. State of Maryland (4 Wheaton, 316), wherein as attorney-general of Maryland in 1819 he opposed Daniel Webster, William Pinkney, and William Wirt on the question of state rights, and Chief Justice Marshall held that a state tax on the Bank of the United States was unconstitutional. In 1820 Martin was incapacitated for active service by a stroke of paralysis, and although an assistant attorney-general was appointed he was obliged to resign in 1822.
Quotations: “When the tempest rages, when the thunders roar, and the lightnings blaze around us it is then that the truly brave man stands firm at his post. ”
Martin's domestic life was unhappy. After his wife death he courted a wealthy client, the widow of Jonathan Hager, of Washington County, Md. , but she married another man. Martin's daughters married when very young, against his will, and both of the marriages ended tragically. Maria married Lawrence Keene, a naval officer, but soon separated from him and died insane. Eleonora eloped with Richard R. Keene (unrelated to Lawrence), son of a Queen Anne's County farmer, who had entered Martin's office in 1799 and became a member of the bar in 1801. Martin condemned Keene in a series of five pamphlets entitled Modern Gratitude, printed in 1801 and 1802. The son-in-law replied in a pamphlet of fifty printed pages, A Letter from Richard Raynal Keene to Luther Martin, Esq. (1802). Martin later became infatuated with the beautiful Theodosia Burr, who was already married; his "idolatrous admiration" for her doubtless served to blind him to the faults of her father's character.
Always of a convivial disposition, he had become increasingly addicted to the use of intoxicants; his brilliant faculties had decayed and he now faced the world broken in health, worn out in mind, and financially destitute. His plight led the legislature to pass a resolution compelling every practitioner of law in the state to pay an annual license fee of five dollars to be turned over to trustees for the use of Martin. During the time the resolution was in effect only one protest was made against it; and it was repealed in 1823 before its constitutionality could be tested. Martin, wrecked by misfortunes, drunkenness, extravagance, and illness, was now welcomed into Burr's home in New York, where he was permitted to remain until the time of his death. He was buried in the Trinity Churchyard in New York. Martin's chief faults were his intemperance and his improvidence in financial affairs. He was a stanch opponent of slavery, and was known for his generosity and his loyalty to his friends. While not a polished orator, he became a leader of the American bar because of his thoroughness and extraordinary memory. Blennerhassett, following Mercer, called him the "Thersites of the law. " Chief Justice Taney said that Martin was "strong in his attachments, and ready to make any sacrifice for his friends". He has been described as "the rollicking, witty, audacious Attorney-General of Maryland; drunken, generous, slovenly, grand; bull-dog of federalism, the notorious reprobate genius". At the time of the Chase impeachment trial, Martin was "of medium height, broad-shouldered, near-sighted, absent-minded, shabbily attired, harsh of voice with a face crimsoned by the brandy which he continually imbibed".
On December 25, 1783, Martin married Maria (sometimes referred to as Mary) Cresap, eldest daughter of Capt. Michael Cresap, Maryland frontiersman. His wife died young, leaving two daughters.
