Beyond guns in the street, the army established a system of provost courts to enforce its laws. The justice they dispensed was hasty and harsh. Trials were often held on the day of arrest and lasted minutes. In the first four months in Honolulu, a single judge dispatched about a hundred cases per day. There were no juries, no journalists, no subpoenaing of witnesses, and, for the most part, no lawyers. Armed military officials, who rarely had legal training, interpreted the facts and the law with maximum discretion—defendants could be and were convicted of violating the “spirit of martial
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