Cite as: 527 U. S. 308 (1999)
Opinion of the Court
dente lite merely because the plaintiff feared that by the time he obtained judgment the defendant would have no assets against which execution could be levied. Applications for such injunctions were consistently refused in the English Commercial Court as elsewhere. They were thought to be so clearly beyond the powers of the court as to be 'wholly unarguable.' " Hetherington, supra n. 9, at 3.
See also Wasserman, Equity Renewed: Preliminary Injunctions to Secure Potential Money Judgments, 67 Wash. L. Rev. 257, 337 (1992) (stating that Mareva "revolutionized English practice"). The Mareva injunction has been recognized as a powerful tool for general creditors; indeed, it has been called the "nuclear weapo[n] of the law." R. Ough & W. Flenley, The Mareva Injunction and Anton Piller Order: Practice and Precedents xi (2d ed. 1993).
The parties debate whether Mareva was based on statutory authority or on inherent equitable power. See Brief for Petitioners 17, n. 8; Brief for Respondents 35-36. Regardless of the answer to this question, it is indisputable that the English courts of equity did not actually exercise this power until 1975, and that federal courts in this country have traditionally applied the principle that courts of equity will not, as a general matter, interfere with the debtor's disposition of his property at the instance of a nonjudgment creditor. We think it incompatible with our traditionally cautious approach to equitable powers, which leaves any substantial expansion of past practice to Congress, to decree the elimination of this significant protection for debtors.
IV
The parties and amici discuss various arguments for and against creating the preliminary injunctive remedy at issue in this case. The United States suggests that the factors supporting such a remedy include
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