Photo: Joshua Kastenberg

Joshua Kastenberg

Professor of Law

Education

  • BA 1989, University of California at Los Angeles
  • MA 1992, Purdue University
  • JD 1996, Marquette University Law School
  • LLM 2003, Georgetown University Law Center

Contact Information

 Ph.: 505-277-5877
 Office: 3214
 

Profile

Prior to joining the UNM Law School faculty this September, Professor Joshua Kastenberg had a 20-year career as a lawyer and judge in the U.S. Air Force. He served as an advisor to the Department of Defense on cyber security and cyber warfare matters, twice deployed to Iraq and oversaw the military’s compliance with international law. Professor Kastenberg served as a prosecutor and defense counsel in over 200 trials and as a judge in over 200 trials. He has been cited by the Washington Post and appeared on Fox News, and written over a dozen law review articles as well as four books. Prior to joining the faculty he taught graduate and undergraduate level courses in national security law and systems as well as legal history. Professor Kastenberg's interests are in the field of criminal law and procedure, evidence, legal history, and judicial ethics.

In the News

Publications

Books & Book Chapters

Military Justice: Cases and Materials (2020) (co-authored with Fidell, Hillman,Rosenblatt, Sullivan & VanLandingham).
Available at: UNM-DR

The Campaign to Impeach Justice William O. Douglas: Nixon, Vietnam, and the Conservative Attack on Judicial Independence (2019).

Military Rules: Expert Qualifications, Admissibility of Expert Testimony, and Competency Hearings, Forensic Psychology in Military Courts (Stein & Younggren eds., 2019).
Available at: UNM-DR

To Raise and Discipline an Army: Major General Enoch Crowder, the Judge Advocate General’s Office, and the Realignment of Civil and Military Relations in World War I (2017).
Available at: UNM-DR

In a Time of Total War: The Federal Judiciary and the National Defense, 1940-1954 (2016) (co-authored with Eric Merriam).
Available at
: UNM-DR

A Confederate in Congress: The Civil War Treason Trial of Benjamin Gwinn Harris (2016).
Available at
: UNM-DR

Shaping US Military Law: Governing a Constitutional Military (2014).
Available at
: UNM-DR

Law in War, Law as War: Brigadier General Joseph Holt and the Judge Advocate General’s Department in the Civil War and Early Reconstruction, 1861-1865 (2011).
Available at: UNM-DR

The Blackstone of Military Law: Colonel William Winthrop, 1831-1899 (2009).
Available at
: UNM-DR

Articles

Commander in Chief Authority and the Religious Rights of Service Members in Crisis Times: The Vaccine Mandate as a Call for Reincorporating the Standing Army Fears in Jurisprudence and Depoliticizing the Bench, 83 Louisiana Law Review (2023)

Goldwater v. Carter: Foreign Policy, China, and the Resurgence of Executive Branch Primacy (Lawrence KS: University Press of Kansas, 2023)

Reassessing the Ahistorical Judicial Use of William Winthrop and Frederick Bernays Wiener, J. NAT'L SEC. L. & POL'Y (Forthcoming 2021).
Available at: SSRN

Fears of Tyranny: The Fine Line Between Presidential Authority Over Military Discipline and Unlawful Command Influence Through the Lens of Military Legal History in the Era of Bergdahl, 49(1) HOFSTRA L. REV. 11 (2021). 
Available at: UNM-DR

Alcohol Prohibition in the New Mexico and Arizona State Judiciaries at 100 Years: The Development of Law and Shaping of Society in the Southwest, 50 N.M. L. REV. 347 (2020).
Available at: UNM-DR

National Security And Judicial Ethics: The Exception To The Rule Of Keeping Judicial Conduct Judicial And The Politicization Of The Judiciary, 12(2) ELON L.J. 282 (2020).
Available at: UNM-DR

Evaluating Judicial Standards of Conduct in the Current Political and Social Climate: The Need to Strengthen Impropriety Standards and Removal Remedies to Include Procedural Justice and Community Harm, 82(4) ALBANY L. REV. 1495 (2019).
Available at: UNM-DR

Safeguarding Judicial Integrity by Making the Executive Branch’s Unfettered Amicus Gateway Transparent: An Argument for the Supreme Court to Exercise its Inherent Authority to Make Public the President’s Tax and Investment Records, 38 N. ILL.  UNIV. L. REV. 1 (2017).
Available at: UNM-DR

Safeguarding Judicial Integrity during the Trump Presidency: Richard Nixon's Attempt to Impeach Justice William O. Douglas and the Use of National Security as a Case Study, 40 CAMPBELL L. REV. 113 (2018).
Available at
: UNM-DR

Command Responsibility in the Twenty-First Century: The United States Basic Framework and Future Military (and Quasi-Military) Operations, 46 SW. L. REV. 46 (2017).
Available at
: UNM-DR

The Right to an Independent Judiciary and the Avoidance of Constitutional Conflict: The Burger Court’s Flawed Reasoning in Chandler v. Judicial Council of the Tenth Circuit and Its Unfortunate Legacy, 8 ST. MARY'S J. LEGAL MAL. & ETHICS 50 (2017).
Available at
: UNM-DR

Chief Justice William Howard Taft's Conception of Judicial Integrity: The Legal History of Tumey v. Ohio, 65 CLEV. ST. L. REV. 317 (2017).
Available at
: UNM-DR

Recent Proposals to Change the Traditional Military Retirement System to Mirror the Federal Service Retirement: Eroding Discipline and Civil-Military Relations Through Potentially Unlawful and Certainly Questionable Acts, 46 CREIGHTON L. REV. 369 (2013)
Available at
: UNM-DR

Nearing Thirty Years: The Burger Court, Strickland v. Washington, and the Parameters of the Right to Counsel, 14 J. APP. PRAC. & PROCESS 215 (2013)
Available at
: UNM-DR

Hugo Black’s Vision of the Lawyer, The First Amendment, and the Duty of the Judiciary: The Bar Applicant Cases in a National Security State, 20 WM. & MARY BILL RTS. J. 691 (2012).
Available at
: UNM-DR

Non-Intervention and Neutrality in Cyberspace: An Emerging Principle in the National Practice of International Law, 64 AIR FORCE L. REV. 43 (2009)
Available at
: UNM-DR

Cause and Effect: The Origins and Impact of Justice William O. Douglas’ Anti-Military Ideology from World War II to O’Callahan v. Parker, 26 THOMAS M. COOLEY L. REV. 163 (2009).
Available at
: UNM-DR

Changing the Paradigm of Internet Access from Government Information Systems: A Solution to the Need for the DOD to Take Time-Sensitive Action on the Niprnet, 64 AIR FORCE L. REV. 175 (2009).
Available at
: UNM-DR

Popular Press

Lt. Col. Vindman is a Patriot, THE SANTA FE NEW MEXICAN (November 2, 2019).
Available at: UNM-DR

Shades of Nixon in Mattis departure, ALBUQUERQUE J. (January 5, 2019).
Available at: UNM-DR

Briefs

Brief for Professors of Law as Amicus Curiae, US v. Bergdahl, (December 11, 2019) (US CT. APP. NO. 19-0406/AR) (ARMY No. 20170582) (co-counsel Vanlandingham & Corn).
Available at: UNM DR

Law School News

Constitutional Crisis: The (retired) Generals & the President
June 18, 2020

Professor Kastenberg Quoted in the New York Times
November 2, 2017

Articles by Prof. Kastenberg published in Southwestern Law Review and Cleveland State Law Review
August 23, 2017

Prof. Kastenberg quoted in San Francisco Chronicle
April 19, 2017

Prof. Kastenberg presents at Pepperdine Law Review Symposium
April 6, 2017

UNM Law School Professor’s New Book Examines Military Legal Expansion in World War I
March 21, 2017

Prof. Kastenberg in demand for military legal expertise
October 25, 2016

Prof. Josh Kastenberg quoted in Washington Post
September 19, 2016

UNM Law School hires two new tenure-track professors
August 22, 2016