![]() Army at age 14 and returned to Newark at 17. ![]() He lied about his age and enlisted in the U.S. His mother died when he was 10, and he began looting factories, got into fights with white gangs, and was arrested and sent to the Essex Youth House twice. The launch of his political career came after a life of early turbulence. He worked as a corrections officer and leader of the Newark branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People before becoming a state legislator.Ī leading force in the rise of Black political representation in the city of Newark, Richardson was 30-years-old when Essex County Democrats put him on their nine-member slate of Assembly candidates in 1961. Rodino (D-Newark) in the Democratic primary after congressional redistricting created a Black majority in New Jersey’s 10th district in 1972.Īs a freshman lawmaker, Richardson helped pass a bill to curb segregated housing that forced people of color to live in ghettos and sponsored legislation that created a commission to study segregation in public schools, fought racially-biased zoning laws. Richardson had sought to become the first Black to serve in the New Jersey Senate and challenged Rep. ![]() ![]() Richardson, a maverick civil rights leader who served four terms in the New Jersey State Assembly in the 1960s and 1970s, died on September 24. ![]()
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