To Joseph Hopkinson
Mount Vernon 3 June 1829
My dear Sir
I recd yesterday afternoon your favor of the 28th may. i do not recollect during the whole of my Judicial life that I was ever applied to for an injunction to stay waste. I confess that until I read your letter and examined the cases you refer to, I had supposed that, if it were a case of irrepable mischief, the plf had only to state an apparently good title, & to verify it by affadavit, to entitle him to the interposition of a court of equity. But the case of Storm vs. Mann and the one from 6 vez. are very strong indeed to show, that if the deft claim adversity to the plf, the injunction will not be awarded, notwithstanding the plf should appear to have a good title. As at present advised, I should have great doubt about granting the injunction on the case before you particularly if the question of title appears to be any way doubtful, and the waste complained of be such as an action of trespass might compensate for. As if for example, it concerns merely the cutting down & disposing of common timber, & not ornamental trees & the like. But as you have the bill & answer before you, which I have not, and the benefit, I doubt not, of able arguments, the above hints, for nothing more is intended, may hardly deserve attention.
We had a terrible hot & unpleasant Journey, from which the present pleasant weather is somewhat relieving me. But I am, have been, & shall be for some time so much confined to my study, that I do not feel, or anticipate, more relaxation than I experienced in Phila.— I have as yet had time to ride out but once. God bless you and believe me to be most affectly yrs
Bush. Washington
ALS, PHi: Hopkinson Family Papers. BW addressed the letter to Hopkinson in Philadelphia. The letter was postmarked on 4 June in Alexandria.