William Cabell Bruce

In the record (2)

1. 1911

   Black Baltimore attorney W. Ashbie Hawkins complains to the Maryland Public Service Commission against the B.C.&A. - Ocean City's railroad - over Jim Crow accommodation on its bay boats.

   In December 1911 W. Ashbie Hawkins, the pioneering Black Baltimore civil-rights lawyer, filed suit against the Baltimore, Chesapeake and Atlantic Railway — the company whose rail-and-steamboat line from Baltimore via Claiborne was Ocean City's lifeline — charging discrimination against Black passengers on its Chesapeake Bay steamers Avalon and Joppa: cramped, poorly ventilated segregated cabins, leftover food, and A.M.E. ministers and their wives denied staterooms overnight. The complaints were ultimately dismissed, though the Public Service Commission recommended more equal seating arrangements. FORUM: not a court suit but a complaint to the Public Service Commission of Maryland (org:maryland-public-service-commission), later appealed to Circuit Court No. 2 of Baltimore City in February 1912. ROUTE: the reported decision concerns the CHOPTANK RIVER route, not the steamers Avalon and Joppa. No source read names either vessel. The Avalon/Joppa detail should be removed or attributed to Bogen rather than asserted. DATE OF OUTCOME: the dismissal is March 1912, not 1911. The 1911 event is the complaint being pending. 'the Public Service Commission recommended more equal seating arrangements' is not supported by anything read; it is not in Laird's reported opinion. Drop unless Bogen supports it. ADD: Hawkins was elected Supreme Chancellor of the Knights of Pythias of the Eastern and Western Hemispheres at Asbury Park on 12 September 1911, three months before the complaint - see fact:1911-hawkins-elected-supreme-chancellor.

   Baltimore, Chesapeake & Atlantic RailwayPublic Service Commission of MarylandW. Ashbie Hawkins

   Source · checked 2026-08-11

2. 1925 · 1925-08-29

   On 29 August 1925 nine Eastern Shore counties met at the Atlantic Hotel to demand the repeal of federal power over roads, schools, child labour and Prohibition.

   Worcester Democrat, 22 August: "A convention and mass meeting to protest against Federal encroachment on the rights of the States will be held at the Atlantic Hotel, Ocean City, Md., on Saturday, August 29th, under the auspices of a Home Rule Convention of the Eastern Shore of Maryland." On 29 August, under "STATES' RIGHTS MEET AT OCEAN CITY TODAY — Senator William Cabell Bruce Will Be The Chief Speaker—Dry Mention Likely — NINE COUNTIES WILL HAVE DELEGATIONS": "The convention will mark the Eastern Shore's first organized interest in States' rights." The resolutions, printed on 5 September, ran: "Before the 18th Amendment, the people were content and law-abiding. Since the 18th Amendment the coasts and bays are filled with smugglers, and the fields and forests with illicit stills, furnishing the people, young and old with poisonous liquors. Therefore be it resolved by this Convention of Eastern Shoremen, assembled at Ocean City, Maryland on August 29, 1925: 1. That we demand from Congress an immediate cessation of the tendency to concentrate at Washington control over the purely local concerns of the States. 2. That we demand a repeal of all laws which vest or attempt to vest in the Federal Government power over such local matters as education and roads, the prohibition or regulation of alcoholic liquors or the like… 4. That we declare our unalterable opposition to the proposed child labor amendment to the Constitution of the United States." The dry Midland Journal of Rising Sun answered on 4 September: "With such men as Senator Bruce and Congressman John Philip Hill, of Maryland, of well known wet proclivities, dominating the convention and railing, as usual, at the Prohibition Amendment, it is not hard to see that the 'Home Rule' convention was just another wail of Maryland's wet politicians."

   Ocean City's grand hotel spent its last summer as the meeting-place of the Eastern Shore's anti-Prohibition revolt — and four months later it burned down.

   Atlantic HotelHome Rule Convention of the Eastern Shore of MarylandJohn Philip Hill

   Source · checked 2026-08-06