Pharmaceutical compositions are provided that are useful in treating immunological diseases. The compositions comprise a pharmaceutically acceptable carrier, and an effective therapeutic or prophylactic amount of a nitroxide antioxidant that alters the expression of a gene related to an immunological disease. Methods are also provided for the use of the pharmaceutical compositions in the treatment or prevention of immunological disease. In a preferred embodiment, the nitroxide antioxidant is Tempol (4-hydroxy-2,2,6,6-tetramethylpiperidine-1-oxyl); the gene is one of glucocorticoid-induced leucine zipper, collagen type I alpha 1, and complement component 6; and the immunological disease is Graves' disease, Hashimoto's thyroiditis, autoimmune polyglandular syndrome, insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus, insulin-independent diabetes mellitus, immune-mediated infertility, autoimmune Addison's disease, pemphigus vulgaris, pemphigus foliaceus, dermatitis herpetiformus, vitiligo, autoimmune hemolytic anemia, autoimmune thrombocytopenic purpura, pernicious anemia, myasthenia gravis, multiple sclerosis, Guillain-Barre syndrome, stiff-man syndrome, acute rheumatic fever, sympathetic ophthalmia, Goodpasture's syndrome, systemic lupus erythematosus, rheumatoid arthritis, systemic necrotizing vasculitis, Wegener's granulomatosis, antiphospholipid syndrome, Sjögren's syndrome, scleroderma, accelerated graft arteriosclerosis, graft-versus-host disease, Crohn's disease, or tuberculosis.