Lather Martin, an American lawyer, horn in New Brunswick, N. J., in 1744, died in New York, July 10, 1826. He graduated at the college of New Jersey in 1762, and till 1770 taught school at Queenstown, Md. In 1771 he was admitted to the bar in Accomac county, Va., and soon afterward removed to Baltimore. In 1774 he was a member of the convention at Annapolis to oppose the claims of Great Britain, and he published an "Address to the Inhabitants of the Peninsula between the Delaware River and the Chesapeake," urging resistance to British usurpation. In 1778 he was appointed attorney general of Maryland; in 1784-'5 was a delegate to the continental congress; and in 1787 a member of the convention which framed the federal constitution, the adoption of which he opposed, mainly on the ground that it did not sufficiently recognize the equality of the states by giving to each the same number of representatives. On his return he delivered before the Maryland assembly an elaborate address, afterward published under the title, " Genuine Information delivered to the Legislature of the State of Maryland relative to the Proceedings of the General Convention lately held in Philadelphia" (Philadelphia, 1788). In 1805 he defended Samuel Chase, an associate justice of the United States supreme court, who was impeached by the house of representatives for malfeasance, and was fully acquitted.

In 1807 he was engaged with John Wickham, William Wirt, and John Randolph in the successful defence of Aaron Burr. In 1813 he was appointed chief judge of the court of oyer and terminer for Baltimore, and in 1818 he again became attorney general of Maryland and district attorney of Baltimore. In 1820 he was struck with paralysis, and two years afterward, with broken health and ruined fortune, he removed to New York to find refuge with Aaron Burr. He was a violent politician, and published essays against Jefferson and his party.