In Carroll v. United States, 267 U.S. 132 (1925), the court held that automobiles and other conveyances may be searched without a warrant in circumstances that would not justify the search without a warrant of a house or an office, provided that there is probable cause to believe that the automobile contains articles that the officers are entitled to seize. The court noted that the search of an automobile on probable cause proceeds on a theory wholly different from that justifying the search incident to an arrest. The Court found that: "the right to search and the validity of the seizure are not dependent on the right to arrest. They are dependent on the reasonable cause the seizing officer has for belief that the contents of the automobile offend against the law." 267 U.S. at 158-159.