Lonesome v. Maxwell

Decision Date27 July 1954
Docket Number6879.,Civ. No. 5965,5847
Citation123 F. Supp. 193
PartiesLONESOME et al. v. MAXWELL et al. DAWSON et al. v. MAYOR & CITY COUNCIL OF BALTIMORE et al. ISAACS et al. v. MAYOR & CITY COUNCIL OF BALTIMORE et al.
CourtU.S. District Court — District of Maryland

Jack Greenberg, New York City, Linwood G. Koger, Jr., Tucker R. Dearing, Baltimore, Md., for plaintiffs.

Edward D. E. Rollins, Atty. Gen., W. Giles Parker, Asst. Atty. Gen., for R. Brooke Maxwell and others.

Thomas N. Biddison, City Sol., Edwin Harlan, Deputy City Sol., Hugo A. Ricciuti, and Francis X. Gallagher, Asst. City Sols., Baltimore, Md., for Mayor and City Council of Baltimore and others.

David P. Gordon and A. Frederick Taylor, Baltimore, Md., for Sun & Sand, Inc.

THOMSEN, District Judge.

The motions for judgments on the pleadings in these three cases raise a single legal question: Does segregation of the races by the State of Maryland and the City of Baltimore at public bathing beaches, bath houses and swimming pools deny plaintiffs any rights protected by the Fourteenth Amendment.

No. 5965

In this case, filed in August, 1952, plaintiffs, adult and minor Negroes, brought suit against the Commissioners of Forests and Parks of the State of Maryland, and the Superintendent of Sandy Point State Park and Beach, to restrain defendants from operating the bath houses and bathing facilities at Sandy Point State Park on a segregated basis. Plaintiffs alleged that the facilities afforded Negroes were not equal to those afforded whites and that they had been denied admission to the facilities reserved for whites solely because of their race or color. Defendants answered, denying that the facilities were not substantially equal.

On June 4, 1953, following a hearing on plaintiffs' motion for a preliminary injunction, Judge Chesnut entered an order in which he found that the South Beach facilities (for whites) were superior to those at East Beach (for Negroes), and restrained defendants from excluding any person, solely on account of race and color, from the facilities at South Beach. On July 1, 1953, having improved the facilities at East Beach, defendants moved to vacate the preliminary injunction. After a hearing Judge Chesnut entered an order on July 9, 1953 in which he found as a fact that as of the date of said hearing the bathing facilities at East Beach were at least equal to those at South Beach, and vacated and struck out the preliminary injunction theretofore granted, with the right to plaintiffs to renew their motion at any time the facilities at South Beach and East Beach may not be in substantial equality.

No. 5847

In this case, filed in May, 1952, plaintiffs, adult and minor Negroes, are suing the City of Baltimore, its Board of Recreation and Parks, the Director of the Bureau of Recreation and Parks, and Sun and Sand, Inc., a corporation which operates a concession under the supervision and control of that Board at Fort Smallwood Park, to restrain defendants from operating the bath houses and bathing facilities at Fort Smallwood Park on a segregated basis, alleging that the facilities afforded Negroes are not equal to those afforded whites, and that they were denied admission to the facilities reserved for whites solely because of their race or color. Defendants answered, denying that the facilities are not substantially equal.

No. 6879

In this case, filed in September, 1953, plaintiffs seek to restrain defendants from operating on a segregated basis any swimming pool established, operated and maintained by the City of Baltimore. Defendants are the City, its Board of Recreation and Parks, the Director of the Department of Recreation and Parks, and the Superintendent of Parks and Pools. One of the plaintiffs is white; all the rest of the plaintiffs are Negroes. Plaintiffs allege that the bathing facilities which defendants provide for Negroes are not equal to those provided for white persons. Plaintiffs also allege that defendants, by operating the facilities on a segregated basis, deny plaintiffs the right to associate with their friends. Defendants answered that the facilities afforded Negroes are substantially equal to those afforded white persons, and that any denial of use of the bathing facilities which plaintiffs may have experienced was a result of the enforcement of rules and regulations establishing a policy of segregation in the use of bathing facilities in the public parks of Baltimore City.

In all of the cases further proceedings were delayed pending the decision of the Supreme Court in the school segregation cases.

Several days after the filing of the opinion in Brown v. Board of Education, 1954, 347 U.S. 483, 74 S.Ct. 686, counsel for plaintiffs asked this Court to set these three cases for prompt hearing. Counsel for defendants offered no objection, and the court set the hearings for June 22, 1954. Thereafter, on May 29, 1954, plaintiffs filed a motion for judgment on the pleadings in each of the three cases, asserting in each case: (1.) that the complaint alleges a violation of plaintiffs' constitutional rights in that defendants require racial segregation in the facilities which are the subject of this action; (2.) that the answer admits that defendants exclude plaintiffs from these state-(city-) operated facilities to which they sought admission, solely because of their race; and (3.) that such racial segregation violates the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The respective defendants filed answers to these motions, denying that their actions violate the Fourteenth Amendment.

At a pre-trial conference counsel for all parties in No. 5847 (the Fort Smallwood Bathing Beach case) stipulated "that the separate facilities in question herein are physically equal at this time." A similar stipulation was filed in No. 5965 (the Sandy Point Bathing Beach case). Counsel in No. 6879 (the case involving the city swimming pools) stipulated "that the only question to be argued at this hearing is the broad question of the right of the City to segregate the races in public swimming pools. Any other question raised by the pleadings is reserved for argument at some future time, if necessary."

Sandy Point State Park is operated administratively by the Commission of Forests and Parks of the State of Maryland under the authority of Section 340 et seq., Article 66C, Annotated Code of Maryland, 1951 Ed. The law does not require the Commission to operate a bathing beach in a segregated or nonsegregated manner; nor indeed does it require the Commission to operate any bathing beach at all. The facilities at Sandy Point State Park, aside from the bathing beaches and bath houses, are entirely unsegregated, but the Commission has provided separate bathing beaches and bath houses for whites and Negroes, by rules and regulations adopted by the Commission in the exercise of its administrative powers. It was stated at the hearing, without objection or contradiction, that the bath houses and bathing beaches at Sandy Point are the only segregated facilities under the control of the Commission of Forests and Parks of the State of Maryland.

Section 6, Sub-section 19, Baltimore City Charter grants the Mayor and City Council of Baltimore power to establish, maintain, control and regulate parks, squares and municipal recreational facilities; Section 96 of said Charter gives the Board of Recreation and Parks authority to regulate and control the use of recreational facilities in the public parks of Baltimore. Neither the Constitution of Maryland, the City Charter, nor any statute or ordinance requires the Board of Recreation and Parks to operate the bathing, swimming and other recreational facilities on a segregated or unsegregated basis. Over the years the Board of Recreation and Parks has made and modified various rules and regulations dealing with segregation in the public parks. At the present time no parks, as such, are segregated, but certain recreational facilities, including the bathing beaches, the swimming pools, some tennis courts and fields for competitive sports, and some playgrounds and social activities are operated on a segregated basis. Effective July 10, 1951, the Board of Recreation and Parks set aside for inter-racial play certain athletic and recreational facilities in a number of parks. Counsel agreed at the hearing that a list of these facilities be made a part of the record, and they are referred to later in this opinion.

The authority of the respective boards to make the regulations which are challenged in these cases is supported by Durkee v. Murphy, 1942, 181 Md. 259, 29 A.2d 253, a case involving the segregation of white and Negro players on municipal golf courses. In that case Chief Judge Bond, after referring to the relevant sections of the Baltimore City Charter of 1938 (not substantially different from those of the present Charter of 1946) which conferred powers upon the Park Board to make rules and regulations, said:

"And these provisions must, we conclude, be construed to vest in the Board the power to assign the golf courses to the use of the one race and the other in an effort to avoid any conflict which might arise from racial antipathies, for that is a common need to be faced in regulation of public facilities in Maryland, and must be implied in any delegation of power to control and regulate. There can be no question that, unreasonable as such antipathies may be, they are prominent sources of conflict, and are always to be reckoned with. Many statutory provisions recognize this need, and the fact needs no illustration. `Separation of the races is normal treatment in this state.' Williams v. Zimmerman, 172 Md. 563, 567, 192 A. 353, 355. No additional ordinance was required therefore to authorize the Board to apply this normal treatment; the authority would be an implied incident of the power expressly given." 181 Md. at page, 265, 29 A. 2d at page 256.

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  • Shuttlesworth v. Gaylord
    • United States
    • U.S. District Court — Northern District of Alabama
    • November 8, 1961
    ...of Baltimore, 4 Cir., 220 F.2d 386; affirmed by Supreme Court, 350 U.S. 877, 76 S.Ct. 133, 100 L.Ed. 774 reversing the trial court, D.C., 123 F.Supp. 193, in refusing to enjoin segregation of the Negro and white races at public bathing beaches, bathhouses, and swimming pools; Department of ......
  • Fayson v. Beard
    • United States
    • U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Texas
    • September 7, 1955
    ...the United States striking down the practice of segregation of the races in certain fields, the District Judge, as shown by his opinion, 123 F.Supp. 193, did not feel free to disregard the decision of the Court of Appeals of Maryland in Durkee v. Murphy, 181 Md. 259, 29 A.2d 253, and the de......
  • Dawson v. Mayor and City Council of Baltimore City
    • United States
    • U.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit
    • March 14, 1955
    ...the United States striking down the practice of segregation of the races in certain fields, the District Judge, as shown by his opinion, 123 F.Supp. 193, did not feel free to disregard the decision of the Court of Appeals of Maryland in Durkee v. Murphy, 181 Md. 259, 29 A.2d 253, and the de......
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