What Is The Fourth Amendment?
For the next several blog entries, we will discuss the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution to The United States of America. Let us begin with the text of the Fourth Amendment and we will explore the meaning and interpretation of this amendment over the course of the next several weeks.
The Fourth Amendment 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.
In this one sentence, albeit with many clauses, the Framers guaranteed years and years of litigation. In fact, it is hard to imagine any other Amendment more consistently litigated than the Fourth Amendment. Over the course of the next few weeks, we will address this Amendment and relevant case law in this order (1) what is an UNREASONABLE
search and seizure? (2) What is a warrant? (3) What is probable cause? (4) What is the particularity requirement of a warrant, as required by the Fourth Amendment? Obviously, there will be a lot of intertwining and overlap.