Voltairine de Cleyre was an American anarchist and sexual equality activist. She was a prolific writer and speaker, opposing the state, marriage, and the domination of religion in sexuality and women's lives. A proponent of libertarian socialism and the freethought movement, de Cleyre was initially drawn to individualist anarchism but later called herself only an anarchist, shunning doctrinal fractiousness. She was a colleague of Emma Goldman, with whom she maintained a relationship of respectful disagreement on many issues. Voltairine de Cleyre's political perspective shifted throughout her life, eventually leading her to become an outspoken proponent of "anarchism without adjectives," a doctrine, according to historian George Richard Esenwein, "without any qualifying labels such as communist, collectivist, mutualist, or individualist.
