The Fourth Amendment is a great representation of the freedoms that the founders of the United States sought to establish in this country. This same freedom plays a key role in shaping every day police work as well as cases in court. These same ideals have also caused some hardship for law enforcement officers that neglect to yield to proper procedure. Some aspects that have been created from that very ideal allow criminals to avoid prosecution due to technicalities. Yet, the Fourth Amendment and all law that stems from it are important aspects that shape everyday law enforcement. The reach of the Fourth amendment is incredibly extensive, to the point that every one of the millions of arrest made annually is a Fourth Amendment event (Bradley). The same occurs when officers search any spaces or persons for evidence. The fourth amendment acts a guard when someone’s privacy is diminished by a government search or seizure (Bradley). It protects a person’s “legitimate expectation of privacy” set as standard in the case Katz v. United States (1967) (Bradley). The Fourth amendment in its entirety states: “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.” This means that citizens of the United States are protected from unreasonable searches and seizures. It also means that citizens can feel secure within their homes and with their property, without fear of this right being breach without proper cause. This amendment also requires an official warrant to be issued specifically stating what can be searched and seized. Similar to the rest of the Bill of Rights, the Fourth amendment origin comes from seventieth and eighteenth-century English common law (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History).
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Yet unlike the rest of the Bill of Rights, the Fourth Amendment can be traced precisely to three cases from the 1760s (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). Two of which were decided in England and the last in the colonies, all three cases sparked strong reactions of the public (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). The first two cases were held in England and were treated as a pair. Both Wilkes v. Wood, 19 Howell’s States Trials 1153(C.P. 1763), and Entick v. Carrington, 19 Howell’s State Trials 1029 (C.P. 1765), involved pamphleteers charged with seditious libel of criticizing the King’s minister and by extension, the King himself (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). In both cases, agents of the king issued warrants authorizing the ransacking of the defendant’s houses and the seizure of all books and papers within (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). While warrants in modern day America require the signature of a magistrate and probable cause under oath or affirmation, seventieth and eighteenth-century English common law warrants could be written by any agents of the King and for any reason. Once the searches were carried out, the two defendants sued for damages, claiming that the warrants were void and, therefore, illegal (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). Both defendants won, with very influential opinions issued by Lord Camden who judged both of the cases (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). These decisions marked a turning point where the government could not get away with an unreasonable search and seizure. This decision also made Lord Camden a hero in the colonies and a number of towns and cities were named after him because of his landmark decision (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). The last of the three cases was known as the Writs of Assistance case (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). It involved British customs inspectors seeking to halt smuggling in colonial Boston and were given blanket search warrants called writs of assistance. (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). These warrants allowed for customs inspectors to search anyplace where they though smuggled goods may be (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). The wits even allowed inspectors to compel citizens to help them undertake
Yet unlike the rest of the Bill of Rights, the Fourth Amendment can be traced precisely to three cases from the 1760s (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). Two of which were decided in England and the last in the colonies, all three cases sparked strong reactions of the public (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). The first two cases were held in England and were treated as a pair. Both Wilkes v. Wood, 19 Howell’s States Trials 1153(C.P. 1763), and Entick v. Carrington, 19 Howell’s State Trials 1029 (C.P. 1765), involved pamphleteers charged with seditious libel of criticizing the King’s minister and by extension, the King himself (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). In both cases, agents of the king issued warrants authorizing the ransacking of the defendant’s houses and the seizure of all books and papers within (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). While warrants in modern day America require the signature of a magistrate and probable cause under oath or affirmation, seventieth and eighteenth-century English common law warrants could be written by any agents of the King and for any reason. Once the searches were carried out, the two defendants sued for damages, claiming that the warrants were void and, therefore, illegal (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). Both defendants won, with very influential opinions issued by Lord Camden who judged both of the cases (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). These decisions marked a turning point where the government could not get away with an unreasonable search and seizure. This decision also made Lord Camden a hero in the colonies and a number of towns and cities were named after him because of his landmark decision (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). The last of the three cases was known as the Writs of Assistance case (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). It involved British customs inspectors seeking to halt smuggling in colonial Boston and were given blanket search warrants called writs of assistance. (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). These warrants allowed for customs inspectors to search anyplace where they though smuggled goods may be (Search and Seizure: Origins, Text, And History). The wits even allowed inspectors to compel citizens to help them undertake