Lucretia Mott (née Coffin; January 3, 1793 – November 11, 1880) was an American Quaker, abolitionist, women's rights activist, and social reformer. She had formed the idea of reforming the position of women in society when she was amongst the women excluded from the World Anti-Slavery Convention held in London in 1840. In 1848, she was invited by Jane Hunt to a meeting that led to the first public gathering about women's rights, the Seneca Falls Convention, during which the Declaration of Sentiments was written.

Her speaking abilities made her an important abolitionist, feminist, and reformer; she had been a Quaker preacher early in her adulthood. She advocated giving black people, both male and female, the right to vote (suffrage). Her home, with husband the Quaker leader James Mott was a stop on the Underground Railroad. Mott helped found the Female Medical College of Pennsylvania and Swarthmore College and raised funds for the Philadelphia School of Design for Women. She remained a central figure in reform movements until her death in 1880. The area around her long-time residence in Cheltenham Township is now known as La Mott, in her honor.

Lucretia Coffin was born January 3, 1793, in Nantucket, Massachusetts, the second child of Anna Folger and Thomas Coffin. Her father, Capt. Thomas Coffin was a descendant of one of the original purchasers of Nantucket Island and carried on his forefather's occupation as a whale-fisherman. Her mother ran the family mercantile business and traded in Boston for goods in exchange for oils and candles from the island. Lucretia often ran small errands for her mother, scouring the wharves for supplies and aid for her family. Through her mother, she was a descendant of Peter Folger, a missionary on Nantucket in the mid-1600s. Her cousin was Benjamin Franklin, one of the Framers of the Constitution, while other Folger relatives were Tories, those who remained loyal to the British Crown during the American Revolution.

In 1803, at the age of 10, her father moved the Coffin family to Boston to become a merchant. She was sent at the age of 13 to the Nine Partners School, located in Dutchess County, New York, which was run by the Society of Friends (Quakers). James Mott, who would become her husband, was her teacher there. At the age of 15, she became a teacher there after graduation and learned that male teachers at the school were paid significantly more than female staff, which ignited her interest in women's rights. She was also interested in fighting slavery as a child. After her family moved to Philadelphia in 1809, she and James Mott followed in 1810. James became a merchant in the city.

On April 10, 1811, Lucretia Coffin married James Mott at Pine Street Meeting in Philadelphia. James was a Quaker businessman who shared her anti-slavery interests, supported women's rights, and helped found Swarthmore College. They raised six children, five of whom made it to adulthood.

Mott died on November 11, 1880, of pneumonia at her home, Roadside, in the district now known as La Mott, Cheltenham, Pennsylvania. She was buried at Fair Hill Burial Ground, a Quaker cemetery in North Philadelphia. At her funeral, a long silence took place. It was broken when someone asked, "Who can speak? The preacher is dead."

In 1821, at age 28, Mott was recognized by her Friends Meeting ("recorded") as a minister. By then she had been preaching for at least three years. She summarized her perspective by stating: "I always loved the good, in childhood desired to do the right, and had no faith in the generally received idea of human depravity." Mott traveled throughout the United States — New England, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Maryland, Ohio, and Indiana — and to England. Rare for the time, Mott was among a group of single and married women, including Jane Fenn Hoskens and Elizabeth Fry, who traveled as part of their Quaker ministry. She was described as a woman of "gentle and refined manners and of great force of character." Her sermons emphasized the Quaker inward light or the presence of the Divine within every individual, as preached by Elias Hicks. Mott and her husband followed Hicks' theology, which became the focus of a schism among Quakers who divided into either Hicksite or Orthodox. As a result, Mott served as clerk of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting and traveled in the Hicksite ministry. The Hicksites, the liberal branch, were sometimes considered to be Unitarian Quakers. The Hicksites were more prone to be part of social reform moments, including abolitionism and the fight for women's rights. Other Hicksite Friends were Susan B. Anthony and Alice Paul. Mott's sermons included her free produce and other anti-slavery sentiments.

Mott's theology was influenced by Unitarians including Theodore Parker and William Ellery Channing as well as early Quakers including William Penn. She believed that "the kingdom of God is within man" (1749). Mott was among the religious liberals who formed the Free Religious Association in 1867, with Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise, Ralph Waldo Emerson and Thomas Wentworth Higginson.