In United States v. Jacobsen, a substance was uncovered by private parties and chemically analyzed by drug enforcement agents. The court of appeals held that the analysis, which was done without a warrant, constituted a search and therefore violated the defendants' fourth amendment rights. Under nearly identical circumstances, the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit in United States v. Barry reached the opposite conclusion, holding that there was no search; therefore, no warrant was required to conduct a field test of contraband uncovered in a private search. In both these cases, the defendants were to receive packages voluntarily conveyed to private carrier companies. They assumed the risk that the packages would be damaged and the contents uncovered in the normal course of business. They also assumed the risk that any discovery of the illegal contents would be disclosed to government agents. The result is that even if the defendants possessed a subjective expectation of privacy in their contraband, such an expectation is not one that society is prepared to recognize as reasonable. The reasoning in United States v. Barry is therefore correct. No fourth amendment protection against warrantless chemical testing of contraband exists. Accordingly, no warrant should be required for chemical analysis of contraband uncovered in a private search. Included are 117 references.