You add, that other Houses have fallen in the Streets and are suffered to remain: but does it follow from hence that they are to continue in the Streets? and is there not a wide difference between a House built—& a house building?
In 1791, Daniel Carroll of Duddington, a District resident, was in the middle of an argument with Pierre Charles L'Enfant, city planner for the new capital. Carroll had built a house where L'Enfant wanted a road, but Carroll was reluctant to have it torn down. Washington wrote to convince Carroll to move the house, at federal expense. What Washington did not know was that L'Enfant had already torn down Carroll's house a few days before.