 He attended the public schools, and engaged in business as a sewer contractor and later as a coal dealer.Martin served as alderman in the city council from 1894 to 1903, 1905 to 1907, 1910 to 1913, and was again elected in 1915.Martin was elected as a Democrat to the Sixty-fifth Congress and served from March 4, 1917, until his death in Chicago, Illinois, October 28, 1917.