Warrant

Warrant, an authorisation from the proper authority to a person to do something which he has not otherwise a right to do. The more formal warrants are under the hand and seal of the person granting them. The kinds of warrants are innumerable—informal instruments authorising a person to receive money or goods, such as dock-warrants, dividend-warrants, share-warrants, and formal legal warrants used in civil and criminal cases. Warrant of attorney is dealt with at ATTORNEY. The more important judicial warrants are the bailiff's-warrant, the sheriff's authorisation to a bailiff to execute a writ; the warrant to answer, issued by a justice of the peace, for the apprehension of a person accused of an indictable offence; the bench-warrant, issued by the court before which an indictment has been found, to arrest the accused; and the warrant of deliverance, for discharging from prison a person who has been bailed. General warrants, issued against no one person named, but against all persons suspected, were formerly in use, and proved an instrument of oppression; in the case of Wilkes, such a general warrant issued by a secretary of state to search for and seize the papers of the author (not named) of a seditious libel was decided to be illegal. In Scotland, after the declaration of an accused person has been made, if there be reasonable grounds of suspicion against him, the magistrate grants a warrant, the warrant of commitment, sending him to prison to abide the result of his trial. By statute 1701, chap. 6, this warrant must be in writing and duly signed; it must specify the particular offence charged, and must proceed on a signed information. There are, further, the distress-warrant, issued for raising a sum of money upon the goods of a party specified in the warrant; and the search-warrant, granted by a justice of the peace to a constable to enter the premises of a person suspected of secreting stolen goods, or of keeping gunpowder, nitro-glycerine, liquors, &c. contrary to law. Contrary to a common impression, no special warrant is required for capital punishment, the so-called death-warrant being simply the calendar of the prisoners' names, with their punishments on the margin, signed by the judge. In the United States warrants must not issue save on probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, describing the person to be arrested or place to be searched. See ARREST, CRIMINAL LAW.