Seth Luther (1795 – April 29, 1863) was an American antebellum workers' and suffrage organizer based in Providence, Rhode Island.
The "Avarice" address highlights the contradictions for Luther in the emerging capitalism of the American economy and the professed Christian ideals of the country.
The noted historian Louis Hartz described in a 1940 biographical essay on Luther how Rhode Island was "a place and time suitable indeed for the growth of a working-class radical" because "parallel with his attack on the social abuses of the new capitalism ran Luther's militant drive to reform the last outpost of reaction in the sphere of suffrage, his own state of Rhode Island.
He told the audience that the vote would be extended "Peaceably if we can, forcibly if we must," which the New Age Constitution and Advocate at the time reported was met with hissing from the "lordly landholders and noted aristocrats.
Luther was part of Thomas Dorr's ill-fated attempt to seize power in Rhode Island by attacking the state arsenal.
He made an unsuccessful escape attempt by setting his prison bedding on fire, but was eventually released in 1843 by a conservative government eager to put the insurrection behind them.