Struggle at the Margins: The Elkton Three and the Power of Noncooperation

Abstract In September 1961, three veterans of radical nonviolence in the linked pacifist and civil rights movements stopped to eat in Elkton, Maryland, while driving to their Philadelphia home from Washington, D.C. The segregated restaurant along Route 40 refused to serve them and called the police when they refused to leave. The trial and imprisonment of the “Elkton Three” brought significant attention to persistent segregation along Route 40. Their defiance strengthened the efficacy of a Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) freedom ride, forcing businesses to desegregate and accelerating civil rights campaigns across East Coast border states. The Elkton Three were at the margins of the movement, both with their use of total noncooperation and their refusal to abide by the dictates of large civil rights organizations. Their marginal position, however, allowed them to be improvisational when confronted with overt racism and brought needed attention and drama to their cause.