23 - Luther Martin (MD)

#23 - Luther Martin (MD)
Birthplace: Brunswick, NJ
Age at Convention: 39

Note: Delegate to the Congress, but did not sign the Constitution because he opposed it's ratification.

1) Religion
-- "we had appealed to the Supreme being for his assistance, as the God of freedom, who could not but approve our efforts to preserve the rights which he had thus imparted to his creatures; that now, when we scarcely had risen from our knees, from supplicating his aid and protection--in forming our government over a free people, a government formed pretendedly on the principles of liberty and for its preservation"
-- "spoke for a few delegates who were "so unfashionable as to think. . . that in a Christian country, it would be at least decent to hold our some distinction between the professors of Christianity and downright infidelity and paganism"

2) Slavery
-- Opposed including slaves in determining representation
-- Denounced any protection of the presence of slavery
-- Owned slaves
-- "we ought rather to prohibit expressly in our constitution, the further importation of slaves; and to authorise the general government from time to time, to make such regulations as should be thought most advantageous for the gradual abolition of slavery, and the emancipation of the slaves which are already in the States"

3) Upbringing
-- Graduated from Princeton with honors

References:
1) http://www.teachingamericanhistory.org/convention/delegates/martin_l.html
2) http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/a1_9_1s8.html
3) http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/martin_marty/2008/01/god_and_the_constitution.html

Running tabulation:
1) Religiously Active (22) or Primarily Secular (11)
2) Abolitionist (14), Partial Abolitionist (15) or Non-Abolitionist (4)
3) Wealthy (13) or Middle-Class/Poor (20)