Professor Michael McGinniss to Chair a National Federalist Society Executive Committee
McGinniss will serve as chair of the Executive Committee for the Professional Responsibility and Legal Education Practice Group.
Effective November 2025, Michael McGinniss, professor of law and J. Philip Johnson faculty fellow and former dean of the School of Law, will serve as chair of the Executive Committee for the National Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies Practice Group on Professional Responsibility and Legal Education. He currently serves as vice chair of the committee, which meets each month to address and discuss issues relevant to the practice group, and to plan conference events and other fora for the exchange of ideas in the areas of professional responsibility and legal education.
Professor McGinniss has served as the faculty advisor for the UND School of Law Federalist Society student chapter since he joined the faculty in 2010. He published his article Declaring Independence to Secure Integrity: The Supreme Court Justices’ Code of Conduct, in the Federalist Society Review in 2024. He has also regularly presented his scholarship nationally at events hosted by lawyer and student chapters; twice moderated works-in-progress panels at the annual Federalist Society Faculty Conference; and has thrice been invited to participate as a discussant at academic colloquia sponsored by the Federalist Society and the Liberty Fund.
The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies is a group of conservatives and libertarians interested in the current state of the legal order. It is founded on the principles that the state exists to preserve freedom, that the separation of governmental powers is central to our Constitution, and that it is emphatically the province and duty of the judiciary to say what the law is, not what it should be. The Society seeks both to promote awareness of these principles and to further their application through its activities.
This entails reordering priorities within the legal system to place a premium on individual liberty, traditional values, and the rule of law. It also requires restoring the recognition of the importance of these norms among lawyers, judges, law students and professors. In working to achieve these goals, the Society has created a conservative and libertarian intellectual network that extends to all levels of the legal community.
