Landmark Cases
Entick v Carrington
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Entick v Carrington ([1765] EWHC KB J98; (1765) 19 Howell's State Trials 1029; 95 ER 807) is an English case decided on 2 November 1765 by the Court of Common Pleas under Lord Chief Justice Camden. King's messengers acting under a warrant from the Secretary of State had broken into the home of the writer John Entick and seized his papers while searching for the author of pamphlets critical of the Crown. Entick sued for trespass, and Camden CJ held that no statute or precedent authorized the warrant, so the officers had committed an unlawful trespass. The case is a foundation of English constitutional law for subjecting executive power to the ordinary law and directly influenced the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution.
Facts
Decision Year Decision Date HoldingHeld that the Secretary of State's warrant authorizing the search of Entick's home and seizure of his papers had no basis in statute or precedent, so the King's messengers who executed it were liable for trespass; by the laws of England, every invasion of private property, be it ever so minute, is a trespass, and the silence of the books on any excuse is an authority against the defendant. 1 Current StatusFoundational and undisturbed; its holding that executive officials may act only within powers granted by statute or precedent, never merely because no law forbids the act, remains a cornerstone of English constitutional law and directly shaped the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution. 1 Cross-Tradition Connections
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Rule of Law, Doctrines Entick v Carrington is a foundational English rule-of-law case: it holds that executive officials may act only within powers granted by law.
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