Reflections from the Chairman

Senator H.L. Richardson is the Founder and Chairman of Gun Owners of America and Gun Owners of California. He served for 22 years in the California Senate during which time he sponsored legislation (which became law) that protected homeowners from prosecution when they use lethal force in the defense of their domicile. Sen. Richardson sponsored a preemption law that was the basis of a California Supreme Court decision which overturned San Francisco’s handgun ban.

Richardson was the Caucus Chairman of the Senate Republicans and was named legislator of the year eleven times by various organizations. He took his political prowess outside the legislature by organizing a statewide campaign that resulted in the reelection defeat of three justices of the state supreme court.

The lessons learned about how politics really works led Richardson to found Gun Owners of America and its state analogue, Gun Owners of California. Both these organizations lobby and operate funds to support targeted candidates for federal and California offices. Seeing the need for a legal arm to defend gun owners from hostile prosecutions resulted in the establishment of Gun Owners Foundation.

As active in public life as Richardson has been, he has at the same time been a man who lives with books. His “conversations” with the thinkers and recorders of both the past and present have developed in him the keen eye of an historian who connects the lessons of the past with the issues of our time. He has written several books, which are available here.

His rich background has given him an understanding of how politics works that is unparalleled by any public figure today. He is also an avid big game hunter.