In 1932, he was one of the first two African Americans elected on the Democratic Party ticket to the state house, Richardson was also a leader in gaining passage of state laws that integrated the Indiana National Guard, ended racial discrimination in public accommodations and in Indiana University's student housing, and secured a fair employment practices law for public-works projects.

While attending Shortridge High School, Richardson lived at Indianapolis's Senate Avenue Young Men's Christian Association and waited tables to support himself.

He joined the Democratic Party, which was seeking support from African Americans in what resulted as a historic realignment at the national and state levels.

Richardson and Robert Stanton (representing Gary and Lake County) were also the first African Americans in the twentieth century to be elected to the Indiana General Assembly.

[7] Richardson also sponsored a fair employment practices law that prohibited state or municipal corporations from discriminating in their contracts for public works projects.

Richardson's legislative actions earned him a reputation of a "political maverick", and the Democratic Party did not nominate him for a seat in the state legislature in 1936.

In 1938 Richardson was one of the founders of the Federation of Associated Clubs, a local group of African-American organizations that worked on civil rights reform.

In 1947 Richardson chaired a committee that drafted, sponsored, and lobbied to secure passage of Indiana's "Anti-Hate" Law to eliminate racial segregation in the state.

That same year he also secured a court injunction that barred Dixiecrat Party candidates, including Strom Thurmond, from the Indiana ballot.

[1] Richardson continued to work on civil rights issues, serving as an organization leader and for some groups as a legal representative.

[11][13] In addition to his leadership and civil rights activism in the Urban League, NAACP, and Federation of Associated Clubs, Richardson was involved in numerous other civic, religious, and community service organizations in Indiana.

[3][7] During the 1970s Richardson was among Indianapolis's African-American community leaders who adamantly opposed UniGov, a plan to consolidate some municipal and county government departments.

[15] Richardson, a longtime civil rights lawyer and activist in Indianapolis, is best known for his efforts in 1949 to secure passage of Indiana's school desegregation law,[10] as well as being an outspoken critic of racial prejudice and discrimination.

Richardson also used the state's judicial system to bar Dixiecrat Party candidates from the Indiana ballot in the 1940s and won a landmark legal case against public housing discrimination in 1953.