The Eastern Shore of Maryland is composed of the state's nine counties east of the Chesapeake Bay. The counties are Caroline County, Cecil County, Dorchester County, Kent County, Queen Anne's County, Somerset County, Talbot County, Wicomico County, Worcester County. Some dispute Cecil County as a true Shore county, however, because of the presence of I-95 and related development, proximity to and influence from nearby urban areas such as Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Wilmington, Delaware, and the state of New Jersey, as well as its position straddling the Elk River - leaving half of the county geographically west of the Shore, instead connected to the Western Shore's Harford County.

The Eastern Shore has always been a distinctive region, and has often attempted to split off from the state of Maryland. Proposals have been debated in the Maryland General Assembly in 1833-1835, 1852 and recently in 1999 for the Eastern Shore becoming its own state. Early proposals encompassed a state of the entire Delmarva Peninsula. The proposal in 1999 by State Senators Richard F. Colburn and J. Lowell Stoltzfus did not specify the status of the nine counties of the Eastern Shore after secession.