Luther Martin

(b. Piscataway, N.J., ca. 20 Feb. 1748; d. New York, N.Y., 10 July 1826), lawyer and statesman. Of humble origins, Martin graduated from the College of New Jersey (later Princeton University) in 1766. After studying law, he established a flourishing law practice on the eastern shore of Maryland and Virginia. In 1778 he was appointed state attorney general, a post he held (with interruptions) for the next forty years. As a delegate to the Federal Convention in 1787, Martin championed the cause of the small states and opposed extensive federal powers. A supporter of judicial review, he proposed what became the supremacy clause of the Constitution, without however intending it to be an instrument of national supremacy. Unhappy with the results of the Convention, Martin became an outspoken opponent of the Constitution during the ratification contest.

Aside from his role in the making of the Constitution, Martin is remembered chiefly as an advocate in a number of celebrated judicial cases. Between 1801 and 1813 he frequently appeared in the Supreme Court, arguing mainly admiralty, prize, and marine insurance cases and also the great constitutional case of Fletcher v. Peck (1810). One of his notable performances was as counsel for Justice Samuel Chase in the latter's 1805 impeachment trial. Two years later Martin helped successfully defend Aaron Burr, on trial for treason before Chief Justice John Marshall in the U.S. Circuit Court at Richmond. Martin's last appearance in a major case occurred in 1819, when, as Maryland attorney general, he represented the state in the great bank case McCulloch v. Maryland (1819). In an exhaustive three‐day argument, Martin denied that Congress had power to grant charters of incorporation and insisted, admitting such a power, that the states retained the right to tax federally charted corporations. Shortly after this argument, Martin suffered an incapacitating stroke that rendered him a helpless derelict for his remaining years. In 1823 he was taken in by Aaron Burr, with whom Martin lived until his death three years later.

Highly regarded as a formidable advocate, Martin was renowned for his legal learning. He managed to stay at the top of his profession for many years (though unable to stay out of debt) despite habitual drunkenness and careless personal appearance. A characteristic tendency of his advocacy was to inject personal and partisan feelings. This was particularly evident at the Burr trial, when Martin went out of his way to turn the defense of his client into an indictment of the Jefferson administration.

— Charles F. Hobson

( b Eisleben, 10 Nov 1483; d there, 18 Feb 1546). German reformer. He became a monk in 1505 and two years later was ordained priest. From 1512 he lectured, preached and encouraged the progress of the Reformation, first in the University of Wittenberg, then throughout Germany. A musical boy, he possessed a fine singing voice which he retained as an adult; he played the flute and lute. His practical involvement was matched by an understanding of music theory; and a visit to Rome (c 1510) brought him into contact with the music of many composers, including that of Senfl and Josquin.

Music occupied an important place in his concept of the Reformation, and in 1525 he collaborated with Walter in creating plainchant appropriate to the German language. The close association between words and music was extremely important to his belief that music was ‘the excellent gift of God’. Although he composed two four-part polyphonic sacred pieces (one to a Latin text), his most important works are the numerous hymn melodies which he either composed or arranged.

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Luther Martin (1748-1826) was an American lawyer, Revolutionary War patriot, and member of the Constitutional Convention.

Luther Martin was born in Metuchen, N. J., on Feb. 9, 1748. He attended the grammar school of the College of New Jersey (Princeton) and the college itself, graduating in 1766. Moving to Maryland, he taught school and studied law. Admitted to the Virginia bar in 1771 and to the Maryland bar the next year, he practiced in both colonies. Despite his land ownership and lucrative law practice, Martin mismanaged his financial affairs, and was sued for debt as early as 1770.

Martin's personal life was a succession of tragedies. The deaths of two wives left him with three daughters. One daughter became insane and died. Another married against her father's wishes and died a few years later; her son died in early manhood. Martin himself became infatuated with Aaron Burr's daughter, who was already married.

Martin lent his legal talent to the Revolutionary cause. He published defenses of the patriot position and, as Maryland's attorney general during the war, vigorously prosecuted Tories. As a Maryland delegate to the Constitutional Convention, he made prolix, ungrammatical, and often disorganized speeches, that commanded attention and made him a leading spokesman of the states'-rights interests. He insisted on equal representation of the states in Congress, sought to limit the powers of both Congress and the president, and insisted that the Constitution be submitted to the state legislatures for ratification. He refused to sign the finished document and led opposition to its ratification in Maryland.

Martin's political career became a peculiar combination of adherence to the Federalist party and continued defense of states' rights. His federalism stemmed in part from his intense, personal anti-Jeffersonianism, which exploded in public attacks. His hostility to Jefferson was exacerbated by the 1805 impeachment trial of Supreme Court Justice Samuel Chase, Martin's lifelong friend. Martin's arguments helped bring about Chase's acquittal. In 1807 Martin again opposed Jefferson in the famous treason trial of Aaron Burr; Martin's skillful defense aided in getting Burr acquitted.

In two other important cases, Fletcher v. Peck (1810) and McCulloch v. Maryland (1819), Martin argued for states' rights. However, Chief Justice John Marshall's nationalism proved to be more compelling in both instances and, in the process, produced historic Supreme Court decisions enlarging the scope of national jurisdiction.

Though Martin became increasingly intemperate in later years, his popular reputation was attested by the extraordinary action of the Maryland Legislature in levying a license tax on attorneys to create a trust fund for its now destitute former attorney general. Martin died in New York City on July 10, 1826. Universally acknowledged as a distinguished orator and a legal genius in his day, Martin contributed to the nation's legal development.

Further Reading

The only full-length biography is Paul Clarkson and R. Samuel Jett, Luther Martin of Maryland (1970). It is as definitive as the absence of any significant body of Martin papers allows. Martin's legal career is treated briefly in Charles Warren, History of the American Bar (1911; repr. 1966), and his participation in the Chase and Burr trials more fully in Albert J. Beveridge, Life of John Marshall (4 vols., 1916-1919). Martin's role in the Constitution struggle may be traced in Max Farrand, ed., The Records of the Federal Convention of 1787 (4 vols., 1911-1937; rev. ed. 1966).

(1483-1546) German religious reformer. Luther's political thought was concerned with Church-State relationships, but he brought some new ideas to that protracted controversy. He was born at Eisleben in Saxony and studied classics and philosophy at Erfurt. 1505 he entered the Augustinian Order, and, having studied theology, was ordained in 1507. He lectured at Wittenberg (1508-46) on philosophy and Scripture (mostly New Testament). Basing himself on Paul and Augustine he evolved his doctrine of justification by faith alone. As was common at the time he became critical of Roman practices. In 1517, when the Dominican preacher, John Tetzel, was descending on Wittenberg selling indulgences (remission of punishment due to sin in return for a monetary consideration), Luther posted ninety-five theses against the practice and its implications on a church door.

This marked the beginning of Luther's break with Rome and led by a series of events to what came to be called Lutheranism, the Reformation, and Protestantism. These events of a purely theological and internally ecclesiastical nature do not concern us here, but they set northern Europe in turmoil. Luther had to revise the notions of Church-State relationship to accommodate his new theological ideas. This he attempted to do, but never did satisfactorily.

By 1523 he had clarified his ideas on the Church-State relationship along Augustinian lines in On Secular Authority. Like Augustine he distinguished between two kingdoms: the Kingdom of God; and the Kingdom of the World or Satan. First, Luther's Kingdom of God is free to follow its own conscience. It is a community bound together by love rather than coercion (unlike the Roman Church). The only authority is the word of God which is obeyed freely. There is no external form such as a church nor any distinction between clergy and laity; there is a ‘priesthood of all believers’.

The other kingdom is secular and temporal. It is a divine institution but governed by its own will and reason, and designed to keep the peace by coercion. Christians can participate and hold office in it freely so long as its laws do not conflict with divine law set down in Scripture. Rulers could war with one another as equals and even against the emperor if he was acting tyrannically—this was a secular matter. But the secular kingdom could not interfere in spiritual matters. However, in practice Luther allowed secular authorities to appoint ecclesiastics, pay them, and even interfere in matters of doctrine and worship.

— Cyril Barrett

Luther, Martin (1483-1546). The impact upon France of the great German Reformer's writings and campaigns was most marked in the three decades following his original protest at Wittenberg in 1517, when his teachings on justification by faith, the bondage of the will, consubstantiation, mankind's total depravity, and the iniquities of Rome, were fiercely debated. In later years the French Reformation was dominated by the teachings of Calvin.

As early as February 1519 Luther's 95 theses and his Resolutiones expounding them were being read and welcomed in humanist circles in Paris; Lyon and Avignon were not far behind. In April 1521 the Sorbonne followed Pope Leo X's excommunication of Luther by publishing its Determinatio (final judgement) on his works, which amounts to proscription; in August the Parlement de Paris ordered that all Lutheran books be surrendered. Philip Melanchthon's replies to these censures were similarly condemned by the Sorbonne in 1522, and thereafter study of Luther became clandestine and hazardous. In 1523, after a show trial, Louis de Berquin formally abjured his ‘Lutheran errors’, but an Augustinian from Normandy, Jean Vallière, was the first ‘Lutheran heretic’ to go to the stake in France.

As the persecution intensified, French refugees in the great publishing centres of Basle, Antwerp, and Strasbourg helped to disseminate Luther's works in France, where controversy surrounded the association of Marguerite de Navarre and Marot with Lutheran ideas. Marguerite's support was never explicit, and the Evangelical influence of Lefèvre, Briçonnet, and others was strong; but in a famous case the Sorbonne attempted to censor her Miroir de l'âme pécheresse (1531: issued by Simon Dubois, notorious as a publisher of Lutheran works). Marot was accused of Lutheranism as early as 1526 (see his Épître à Monsieur Bouchard and Enfer), and was proscribed after the second Affaire des Placards in 1535. Thereafter Lutheran fortunes waxed and waned with Francois I^er's political relations with the German Lutheran princes; the king encouraged several attempts to negotiate a doctrinal compromise, particularly with the more pliant Melanchthon, but little was achieved.

An important literary feature of the Lutheran debate was the widespread dissemination of satires, such as the Livre des marchands (1533: on the worldliness of the Roman Church) and the Alcoran des Cordeliers (1560 in French), which exhibit the characteristic abrasiveness and broad humour of Luther's own satires.

[Michael Heath]

Bibliography

• W. G. Moore, La Réforme allemande et la littérature française (1930)
• J. Wirth, Luther (1981)

Luther, Martin (Eisleben, 1483-1546, Eisleben), the dominating personality of the Reformation, was the son of a peasant who had abandoned agriculture for mining and won a modest competence. The boy received his schooling at Mansfeld, Magdeburg, and Eisenach. From 1501 to 1505 he studied successfully at Erfurt University and then entered an Augustinian monastery. His first years of monastic life were consumed in a struggle for the clarification of inner religious conflicts. He was ordained in 1507 and in 1508 taught philosophy at the then recently founded University of Wittenberg. In 1509-10 he lectured at Erfurt and developed his knowledge of Hebrew and Greek. In 1512 he received the degree of Doctor of Theology at Wittenberg, became professor of biblical exegesis there, and delivered between 1513 and 1518 a series of lectures which attracted wide attention and drew students from other parts of Germany.

The beginning of Luther's career as a reformer came almost accidentally when, on 31 October 1517, he nailed to the door of the castle church at Wittenberg his 95 theses (Thesen, see Theses, 95), directed against the sale of indulgences (see Ablasskram). The theses rapidly circulated both in the original Latin and in German translation, and soon adversely affected this source of revenue for the Church. Invited to a disputation at Leipzig with Johann Eck, Luther asserted that the papacy was a historical, not a divine, institution, and denied the authority of rulings by the oecumenical councils. On his return to Wittenberg he plunged into a ferment of theological writing, producing his three outstanding tracts An den christlichen Adel deutscher Nation, De captivitate Babylonica (Von der Babylonischen Gefangenschaft der Kirche), and Von der Freiheit eines Christenmenschen (1520). Through the support of his sovereign, the Elector Friedrich der Weise of Saxony, Luther was able to escape a summons to Rome, but the investigations of Cardinal Cajetan at Augsburg were followed by the Papal Bull Exsurge Domine (1520), demanding recantation. Luther's decisive answer to this was the public burning of the Bull at Wittenberg on 10 December 1520. A Bull of Excommunication was immediately issued (January 1521).

By this time Luther had a large following in Germany, and this popular support aided the Elector in his desire to defer the operation of the Bull until Luther had an opportunity to defend himself before the imperial court. Accordingly Luther was summoned to appear before the Diet at Worms in April 1521 (see Wormser Reichstage). His courageous and unflinching defence (narrated in a famous passage of Ranke) was unavailing and he was outlawed by the Edict of Worms (May 1521). Luther meanwhile was spirited away by his patron's orders and given asylum under the assumed name of Junker Jörg in the Wartburg. Here he spent ten months largely devoted to the translation of the New Testament which appeared in 1522 (see Bible, Translations of). (It was during this period that Luther's legendary confrontation with the devil was alleged to have taken place.) In March 1522 he emerged from hiding and hurried at the risk of his life to Wittenberg, in order to check the excesses of the reforming party led by Karlstadt (Predigten vom Sonntag Invocavit bis Reminiscere).

Luther's opposition to violent insurrection and his insistence on temporal authority became even clearer with the outbreak of the Peasants' War (see Bauernkrieg) in 1525 (Ermahnung zum Frieden and Wider die räuberischen und mörderischen Rotten der Bauern). In that year he married a fugitive nun, Katharina von Bora (1499-1552), an act intended as a symbolical denial of the principle of clerical celibacy; it also initiated a lifelong happy union. In 1526 appeared Luther's order of service for the new Church (Deutsche Messe). In the same year he broke with Erasmus, whose defence of free will in De libero arbitrio he rejected with De servo arbitrio. From 1526 to 1529 he was active in the reorganization of the Church in Saxony. As an outlaw he was necessarily absent from the Diet at Augsburg (1530), at which a compromise between Protestant and Roman Catholic standpoints was unsuccessfully attempted. Luther's protracted and devoted work on the translation of the Bible came to a provisional end with the publication of the complete work in 1534, but he continued to improve his rendering right up to his death (Ausgabe letzter Hand appeared in 1545). He was buried in the castle church (Schloßkirche) at Wittenberg.

The number and bulk of Luther's works, partly in Latin but principally in German, is immense. The Weimar edition, begun in 1883, exceeds 100 vols.; the greater part of it belongs to doctrinal history and theological polemics. In addition to the works cited, mention should be made of the sober and moving account of the martyrdom of Heinrich von Zütphen (Heinrichs von Zütphen Märtyrertod im Jahr 1524), and above all of the masterly tract on translation Ein Sendbrief von Dolmetschen (Ein sendbrieff D. M. Luthers. Von Dolmetzschenn und Fürbit der heiligenn, 1530). Further, Luther was a poet of power who created, partly by translation from Latin or adaptation, a number of moving hymns (Geystliche gesangk-Buchleyn, and Enchiridion geystlicher gesenge, both 1524, the latter expanded repeatedly and last reprinted in Luther's lifetime in 1545); some have found their way into English hymnals. R. Massie (Martin Luther's Spiritual Songs, 1854) and Catherine Winkworth are noted translators. Among the most famous are ‘Ein' feste Burg ist unser Gott’ and the tender Christmas hymn ‘Vom Himmel hoch’. A great mass of observations on the human soul and human affairs is preserved in the Tischreden, collected by his friends and published in 1566. He also translated into German prose a number of fables of Aesop (Etliche Fabeln aus Esopo, 1530).

Luther's greatest literary monument is his translation of the Bible. Though it is now recognized that he owed more to his predecessors than was formerly thought, his ability to render the original into truly German phrasing, direct, memorable, and apt, is unsurpassed. He applied to his work the principle he enunciated in the Sendbrief: ‘den man mus nicht die buchstaben inn der lateinischen sprachen fragen, wie man sol Deutsch reden, wie diese esel thun, sondern man mus die mutter jhm hause, die kinder auff der gassen, den gemeinen man auff dem marckt drumb fragen, und den selbigen auff das maul sehen wie sie reden, und darnach dolmetzschen so verstehen sie es den und mercken, das man Deutsch mit jn redet.’ To these qualities of homeliness, urgency, and power (achieved by extreme conscientiousness as well as good sense) Luther adds a highly developed sense of rhythm, which is especially conspicuous in his rendering of the Psalms. The Lutheran Bible has become, in consequence, a book of immense influence, and reflections of its prose are detectable in many later authors. His idiomatic prose style marks the beginning of a new age in the history of the German language (see German Language, History of).

The essential features of Luther's doctrine are the affirmation of justification by faith, the rejection of justification by works (in Von der Freiheit eines Christenmenschen), and the assertion of direct communication with God without priestly mediation. The immense and rapid success of his teaching over large tracts of Europe was made possible not only by the abuses of the existing Church, but also by the widespread spiritual malaise accumulating through plague, famine, and wars in the preceding century. This is evident in the early tendency of the Reformation to be associated with revolutionary and social unrest. Luther himself denounced the subversive movements, insisting on the duty of the human being to fulfil his obligations within the existing social framework. He thus strengthened the hands of the ruling princes, who gained by the attack on the papacy, and at the same time prepared the swift change of Lutheranism from a dynamic spiritual to a rigid conservative force.

To see Luther as a nationalist is a distortion. He attacked the papacy for spiritual, not political, reasons, and his support of the existing political structure discouraged any trend towards German unity. By concentrating the minds of his contemporaries exclusively on theological and ecclesiastical problems he obstructed the influence of the new humanism as represented by Erasmus. Only three years before his death he expressed his intolerance in matters of faith by calling for the destruction of the synagogues (Von den Juden und ihren Lügen, 1543).

So dominating a figure was bound to become a subject of later literary works, among which may be mentioned: Z. Werner's play Martin Luther oder Die Weihe der Kraft (1807), H. von Kleist's Novelle Michael Kohlhaas (1810, in which Luther makes an important appearance), poems by Uhland (‘Die Ulme von Hirsau’) and by C. F. Meyer (‘Lutherlied’), and novels by L. Schücking (Luther in Rom, 1870) and W. von Molo (Mensch Luther, 1928). Among contemporary works concerned with Luther were Die wittembergisch Nachtigall (1523) by Hans Sachs, and the hostile Von dem Großen Lutherischen Narren by Th. Murner (1522) and Monachopornomachia by S. Lemm (1539).

Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimarer Ausgabe), four sections in more than 100 volumes, appeared 1883 ff.; Ausgewählte Werke (8 vols.), ed. H. H. Borcherdt, 1914-25; an 8-vol. Studienausgabe, ed. O. Clemen and A. Leitzmann, 1950; and Ausgewählte Schriften (6 vols.), ed. K. Bornkamm and G. Ebeling, in 1983.

Luther, Martin (1483-1546) German Augustinian monk and originator of the Reformation in Europe. Luther was professor of biblical theology at Wittenberg when in 1517 he nailed his Ninety Five Theses to the door of the university chapel. Luther was much influenced by William of Ockham, from whom he derived a sceptical view of the edifices of scholasticism, and in particular Thomism. The leading idea of his theology was the doctrine of justification by faith or grace alone—a doctrine which irritated the Catholic church by denying any institutional role in defining or delivering (or selling) proper religious status (grace). Similarly Luther had a dim view of the place of reason and philosophy (‘the devil's whore’) in underpinning proper Christian faith, which comes from God and is revealed not by reason but by revelation. His sermons and hymns are one of the treasures of German literature.

Martin, Luther, c.1748–1826, American lawyer and political leader, b. New Brunswick, N.J. He practiced law in Maryland and became the first attorney general of the state, holding office from 1778 to 1805 and again from 1818 to 1822 (although he was inactive in his last two years of office). He was a delegate to the U.S. Constitutional Convention but refused to sign the Constitution because he felt it violated states' rights. Martin, considered one of the nation's leading lawyers, was one of the defense counsel in the trials of Justice Samuel Chase (1805) and of Aaron Burr (1807). He was a bitter opponent of Thomas Jefferson.

Bibliography

See biography by P. S. Clarkson and S. R. Jett (1970).

Luther Martin was a distinguished lawyer and statesman who played an influential role in U.S. law and politics during the early years of the republic. During most of his legal career, he served as Maryland's attorney general.

Martin was born on February 9, 1748, near New Brunswick, New Jersey. He graduated from the College of New Jersey (now known as Princeton University) in 1766 and then taught school in Maryland for three years. In 1770 he began studying law and was admitted to the Virginia bar in 1771. He established a successful law practice in Maryland and Virginia and became known for his superior legal talents.

In 1774 Martin entered politics as a member of the Annapolis Convention, which was convened to formulate a list of grievances against the British government. In 1778 he was appointed Maryland's first attorney general, a position he would retain for most of the next forty years. He attended the Continental Congress in 1785 and the Constitutional Convention in 1787. Martin was against a strong federal government, preferring that power reside in the states. Unhappy with the final version of the Constitution, he opposed its ratification.

As an attorney, Martin achieved a prestigious reputation and argued several landmark cases before the U.S. Supreme Court. In Fletcher v. Peck, 10 U.S. (6 Cranch) 87, 3 L. Ed. 162 (1810), the Court for the first time invalidated a state law as contrary to the Constitution. The Georgia legislature had revoked a land grant originally permitted by a contract. The Court ruled that public grants were contractual obligations and could not be abrogated without fair compensation. Chief Justice John Marshall based the decision on the Contract Clause of the Constitution (Art. I, Sec. 10, Cl. 1), which provides that no state shall impair the obligations of contract.

Martin also appeared before the Supreme Court in McCulloch v. Maryland, 17 U.S. (4 Wheat.) 316, 4 L. Ed. 579 (1819), where he argued that Maryland had the right to impose a tax on a federally chartered bank. Chief Justice Marshall ruled against Maryland, finding that the state had no authority under the Constitution to tax any agency that has been authorized by the federal government. In Marshall's words, "the power to tax is the power to destroy." Such a power did not comport with the allocation of powers under the Constitution.

Martin also served as counsel in two politically charged cases. In 1804 he helped successfully defend Supreme Court Justice SamuelChase against impeachment. Chase, a Federalist judge who had outraged Democrats with several decisions that appeared to be based as much on politics as law, was acquitted at his Senate trial after Martin convinced senators that the impeachment itself was politically motivated.

In 1807 Martin represented Aaron Burr, who was accused of treason. Martin argued that the charge was baseless and was motivated by President Thomas Jefferson's personal and political dislike of Burr. His indictment of the Jefferson administration helped convince the jury to acquit Burr.

Martin suffered a stroke in 1820, shortly after arguing M'Culloch v. Maryland. Despite his stature and his successful law practice, Martin was insolvent. The Maryland legislature levied a $5 license fee on every attorney to help support Martin. In 1823 Aaron Burr took Martin into his home, where he lived for three years. Martin died on July 10, 1826, in New York City.

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