By late afternoon on Dec. 7, 1941, Gov. Joseph B. Poindexter had declared martial law throughout the Territory of Hawaii, putting the military in control over almost every facet of public and private life.

Martial law most affected people of Japanese ancestry, who made up more than a third of the population. Everyone suspected of aiding the enemy — including community leaders believed to be tied to Japan’s government — was rounded up and arrested, with some held without writs of habeas corpus (legal restraints of liberty). By early 1942 the Army had detained 485 people, including 402 Japanese, Germans and Italians; 29 of the Japanese were American citizens.

The military governor’s authority could not be challenged, and the public leaned over backward to comply. Civil courts were closed, replaced by provost courts and a military commission.

The Army ordered a complete blackout and strict nightly curfew starting at 6 p.m., and for the first few weeks all private cars were barred from the highways, which were dangerous to navigate without headlights. All saloons were closed and the sale of liquor prohibited. All schools, theaters and places people congregated were closed indefinitely. Gasoline was rationed.

All food sales were suspended to permit a complete inventory of island food stocks, which revealed that there was only a 37-day supply of many items.

Strict censorship was imposed for all information media, including radio, as well as all civilian letters and messages sent from Hawaii.

All contractors in town and all construction materials were commandeered to repair and expand airfields and other structures.

There were multiple plans to evacuate almost 118,000 Japanese on Oahu to a neighbor island, or the territory’s entire Japanese population of 170,000 to the mainland — proposals that were pushed by various military officials, including President Franklin D. Roosevelt. But the sheer impracticality of moving so many people, who also constituted a major part of the territory’s labor force, weighed against the evacuation. If they were moved to Molokai, for example, it would require a large amount of construction and building materials to house them at a time when they were needed for the war effort. It would also take additional troops to guard the island, and troops were already spread thin and shipping facilities were already taxed.

Gen. Delos C. Emmons, the military governor, and Lt. Col. Thomas H. Green, who was put in charge of the daily operations, argued against the evacuation. Emmons had also assured the Japanese that if they remained loyal to the U.S., they would be treated fairly, and under martial law he kept everyone under strict control. In his report on martial law, Green said, “We were on the defensive all the way, but in the face of tremendous odds we succeeded in a major degree in preventing the unwarranted, unjust and uneconomical plan of ruthlessly tearing all the Japanese of whatever origin or station from their homes and placing them in detention camps.”

In his report, Green said Japanese citizens were in danger of being attacked by the 40,000 Filipinos and thousands of Chinese living in the islands. China and the Philippines were also at war with Japan. “Of much greater concern to me than any possible mass uprising or resistance by the local Japanese was the ever-present danger that the Filipinos might take it into their heads to start a private war against the 170,000 Japanese,” Green wrote.

The Army eased control of civilians after the Battle of Midway in June 1942, gradually restoring civilian authority, but the suspension of habeas corpus and some degree of martial law continued until Oct. 24, 1944.