Professor of Law and J. Philip Johnson Faculty Fellow, University of North Dakota School of Law
Michael S. McGinniss is Professor of Law and J. Philip Johnson Faculty Fellow at the University of North Dakota School of Law, where he joined the faculty in 2010 and served as the Dean from 2019 to 2022. He chairs the executive committee for the Federalist Society's Practice Group on Professional Responsibility and Legal Education.
Before entering the legal academy, Professor McGinniss served for twelve years as a Disciplinary Counsel for the Supreme Court of Delaware. He currently teaches courses on Professional Responsibility, Advanced Legal Ethics, Civil Procedure, and Federal Courts. He also serves as Faculty Advisor for the North Dakota Law Review and the UND Law Federalist Society student chapter.
Professor McGinniss’ research and scholarship interests are wide-ranging and include lawyer and judicial ethics, lawyer discipline and regulation of the profession, constitutional law (especially First Amendment, separation of powers, and federalism), and cultural challenges faced by conservatives in the law schools and the legal profession. His most recent law review article, Declaring Independence to Secure Integrity: The Supreme Court Justices' Code of Conduct, was published in the Federalist Society Review. His article Expressing Conscience with Candor: Saint Thomas More and First Freedoms in the Legal Profession, was published in the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy.
Professor McGinniss has spoken to Federalist Society lawyer and student chapters across the country about judicial independence and ethics, especially relating to the federal courts and the United States Supreme Court Justices. In addition, he has spoken to several chapters about rising challenges to ideological diversity and targeting of conservative viewpoints in law schools and the legal profession. Although he is very pleased to speak on these and many other topics that may be of interest to lawyer and student chapters, in 2026-2027, he has particular interest in speaking on the topic “Lawyer Discipline as Political ‘Resistance’: Separation of Powers, Federalism, and the Rule of Law,” concerning his work-in-progress on the weaponization of professional disciplinary processes against conservative lawyers for political and ideological purposes.
Senior Counsel, Litigation, Defense of Freedom Institute
Don Daugherty is Senior Counsel, Litigation, at the Defense of Freedom Institute for Policy Studies. He previously served as a Senior Counsel at the Institute for Free Speech and the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty. Before that, he was a partner at three of Wisconsin’s largest firms, with nearly 30 years of trial and appellate litigation experience. He has been consistently recognized as among the “Best Lawyers in America,” as well as Wisconsin’s “Super Lawyers.” He received his B.A. from the University of Virginia and his J.D. from Northwestern University Law School. After law school, he served as a clerk to the Honorable Roger J. Miner of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.
Don is on the Board of Advisors for the Milwaukee Lawyers’ Chapter of the Federalist Society, and on the Executive Committee of the Federalist Society’s Litigation Practice Group.
Topics
States Work to Prevent Noncitizens from Voting
In recent weeks, much attention has been given to the passage in the U.S. House...
Topics
The Judiciary Is Not Just Another Political Branch
There has been a relentless campaign on the Left to politicize—and therefore delegitimize—the Supreme Court...
Topics
Bad Judicial Medicine
This post originally appeared in American Reformer. President Biden and Senator Majority Leader Chuck Schumer recently announced...
Declaring Independence to Secure Integrity: The Supreme Court Justices' Code of Conduct
Michael S. McGinniss
[T]he judiciary is beyond comparison the weakest of the three departments of power; that it...
Topics
Biden’s Executive Order on Artificial Intelligence: An Ill-Advised Departure from Light-Touch Regulation
As promised, just in time for Halloween, late on October 30, the Biden White House...
Topics
Supreme Court Denunciations from the Left and Right are Misguided
Since the Supreme Court wrapped up business on June 30, liberals have condemned the just-ended...
Topics
The Problem with AI Licensing & an “FDA for Algorithms”
Last year, we released a study for the Federalist Society predicting “The Coming Onslaught of...
Topics
Railways, Unions, and Policy Dissonance
Moving with unusual alacrity last week, the Democrat-controlled Congress passed a bill imposing new terms...
Topics
The Third Time is Not the Charm: Significant Problems Remain With Senator Klobuchar’s Antitrust Reform Bill
Since assuming the gavel of the Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Competition Policy, Antitrust, and...
Last Hurrah for the Minimalist Court?
Donald A. Daugherty
A review of SCOTUS 2020: Major Decisions and Developments of the U.S. Supreme Court, edited...