Charles Bruce was appointed by the provincial Congress to purchase firearms and ammunition for troops in April 1776, served as a member of the Halifax Congress in November 1776 on the committee of accounts, was a recruiting officer in 1777, a member of the House of Commons in 1782, a state senator in 1783, a commissioner of confiscated property in 1784, chairman of the county court, a member of the boundary commission for division of Guilford County in 1785, a member of the Council of State in 1790, and a commissioner to build the court house and jail in Greensboro in 1808.