After marrying painter Julia Orynski in 1966, Maverick began to ease himself away from the active practice of law and began to support himself by writing editorials for various newspapers. In 1980, he gave up law completely and began writing a regular Sunday column for the San Antonio Express-News. He continued writing the column for the next twenty-three years. He focused on a variety of subjects, most of which generated considerable controversy, such as his advocacy for the Palestinian people in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and his tribute to Montana Congresswoman Jeannette Rankin, the only member of Congress to vote against entry into both World War I and World War II. His friend and occasional column subject, former state senator A.R. Schwartz, called him "one of the last of the red-hot liberals." In 1991, the American Bar Association awarded him the John Minor Wisdom Public Interest and Professional Award for his handling of more than 300 pro bono legal clients during his career. Wisdom was a liberal Republican from New Orleans who was appointed to the federal bench by U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower. In 1997, a selection of some of his more than one thousand columns was publishing in the title Texas Iconoclast.
