The king's customs officials were
authorized to enter any house, warehouse, shop, or cellar to
search for and seize prohibited or uncustomed goods by a general
writ of assistance.
These writs of assistance had been authorized before and had
angered Bostonians because they had been issued without probable
cause. In Paxton's case of 1761, the Massachusetts Superior Court
had declared legal the issuance of general writs of assistance to
customs officers to search any house for specific goods for which
customs had not been paid. The authority for this was based on the
Parliamentary statutes of 1660 and 1662 authorizing warrants to be
given to any person to enter, with the assistance of a public
official any house where contraband goods were suspected to be
concealed, to search for and seize those goods, using force if
necessary. They were called "writs of assistance" because the
bearer could command the assistance of a local public official in
making entry and seizure. A "general" writ of assistance differed
from a "special" writ of assistance in that the latter was issued
on a one-time basis. The general writ of assistance in Boston was
good for six months after the death of the issuing sovereign.
Authority relied on for such writs was a 1696 statute giving
customs officers in the colonies the same powers as those in
England, a 1699 act by the Massachusetts Provincial Legislature
giving the Superior Court of Massachusetts the same such power as
that of the Exchequer, and the Massachusetts' Governor's direction
about 1757 to the Massachusetts Superior Court of Judicature to
perform the function of issuing such warrants.
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