An abolitionist and a champion of free love and women's rights would seem decidedly out of place in nineteenth-century Texas, but such a man was Stephen Pearl Andrews (1812-1886), American reformer, civil rights proponent, pioneer in sociology, advocate of reformed spelling, lawyer, and eccentric philosopher. Since his life mirrored and often anticipated the various reform movements spawned not only in Texas but in the United States in the nineteenth century, this first biography of him sharply reflects and elucidates his times.

The extremely important role Andrews played in the...