The New York Times reports that Michael W. McConnell, a federal judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit, is leaving the bench to join Stanford Law School:

Michael W. McConnell, a federal judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit, in Denver, will leave the bench to take a position at Stanford Law School, the university announced. Judge McConnell, a highly regarded constitutional scholar and expert on issues of church and state, was appointed in 2002 by President George W. Bush. He will lead the Stanford Constitutional Law Center. A political conservative, Judge McConnell said in a statement released by the school that leaving the judiciary was “a wrenching decision” and that he planned to make the center “one of the nation’s leading forums for vigorous and questioning, but nonpartisan, analysis and debate.”