prosperous age

Li Chunfang ordered Ma Sen to file a report as soon as possible after returning to the household department, and then said to Wei Guangde: "For good loans, you and Ma Shangshu are responsible for the matter of restricting honors to Qi Zhuangtian.

After reporting to the Ministry of Households, you will vote directly to enter the palace. If you still find something wrong, you can raise it in the draft. "

Li Chunfang could see that this matter was actually a struggle between the household department and the relatives, and Wei Guangde was the one who could represent the strength of the relatives in the court.

Leaving this task to others, I'm afraid it will easily cause the dissatisfaction of the relatives.

Directly ask Wei Guangde to vote for an opinion. The general direction has been determined just now, but the difference in the amount of Zhuangtian is irrelevant.

A little more, a little less, that's all.

"By the way, do you have anything else to say?"

After Li Chunfang finished speaking, she suddenly remembered that Wei Guangde only said to increase the amount of Xungui Manor's land, and he hadn't made any other comments, so she asked additional questions.

If you have any ideas, please bring them up at this time, and they will be taken into consideration when the Department of Accounting makes a document.

"Shixun and relatives should be separated. As Shixun said earlier, if two hundred hectares, relatives can be halved. In addition, it is best to list Zhuangtian in detail for those who are abolished, those who donate land and those who are treacherous. Quantity, after all, should be treated differently."

Wei Guangde replied.

"Master Ma, is there any account of this matter?"

Wei Guangde wanted specific figures, because he wanted to know exactly who fell into the hands of the Ministry of Household Affairs.

Cheng Guogong and Ding Guogong have too many belongings, and they have no choice but to ask their families to contribute some money to eliminate the disaster, so as not to be watched by the household department all the time.

"In general, it's just that during the previous discussions with the Ministry of Household Affairs, there were still some disputes about the tombs of the ancestors who were abolished, so it's hard to be sure."

Mason replied.

The abolished include both nobles who committed crimes and were deprived of titles, as well as families whose heirs were cut off.

For officials who have been deprived of titles, the emperor generally remembers the glory of their ancestors, so they only deprive the offenders of their clothes and do not look back.

As for those who cut off their heirs, they would generally choose clan members from their sidelines to succeed them. However, it all depends on the emperor's mood and feelings, so there are also Shixun families that have no heirs and no one to inherit them.

The fields of these people naturally have to be admitted to the government, but the sacrifice of ancestors is also a problem.

In Daming, this is actually a very serious matter and cannot be treated carelessly.

"Destroyer."

After a little hesitation, Wei Guangde said: "That's easy to say, you can reserve five hectares of sacrificial fields for those with more than [-] hectares, and three hectares for those with less than [-] hectares.

However, the Zhuangtian left by these families must be recorded in detail, and the household department must be kept in a separate book for storage. After all, no one knows when His Majesty will remember and select the heirs of the clan. If the detailed records cannot be produced by then, it will be easy. Cause a storm. "

"What Elder Wei Ge said is true, and the Ministry of Household Affairs will definitely follow through."

Mason nodded in agreement.

There are also so-called three-generation single-pass or several-generation single-pass family, but there are not many, and you can actually find relatives if you continue to go up.

The reason why no one inherited it was that the emperor did not want anyone to inherit the family business, mostly because the family offended the emperor.

But politics is something that is often difficult to say.

Just like Marquis Linhuai, how many generations have been broken?
When Emperor Jiajing came here, not only did he restore the Marquis position to the Li family, he was even more fortunate.

In the Longqing Dynasty, it seemed that Emperor Longqing also favored the Li family of Marquis of Linhuai, and let them take over the governor's mansion of the Five Armies.

Although the ancestors of the Li family were once wealthy and were still in the Duke's family, they were stripped of their titles by Emperor Yongle after all.

"Okay, are there any difficult matters in other ministries?"

Li Chunfang asked again at this time.

In fact, the six ministers have already spoken before, and all the matters have been mentioned, and the matter of the Ministry of Household Affairs was also mentioned earlier, but Li Chunfang felt that it was a bit troublesome, so she postponed the discussion until the end.

By this time, in fact, the six parts seem to have no issues to discuss.

As Gao Yi, Yang Bo, and the others went out of order and had nothing else to do, Li Chunfang planned to announce the end of today's cabinet meeting. Wang Ting, the Zuodu censor of the Metropolitan Procuratorate who was present at the meeting, was about to get up, and Wei Guangde's voice sounded again.

"If there are no major issues in the six parts, I have another matter here. I just received Jiangxi's memorial today. It is a major issue. I think it is necessary for everyone to discuss it."

Wei Guangde's loud voice reached everyone's ears.

Everyone first looked at Wei Guangde unanimously, and saw that he had reached out his hand to take out a memorial from his sleeve, and then sat down again.

"Jiangxi? What's the matter?"

Li Chunfang asked in surprise.

In the past two months, the Jiangxi Lanhu rebellion had just subsided. Both the cabinet and the Sixth Ministry were actually afraid of hearing the news.

"Your Excellency, Jiangxi Governor Liu Guangji has been touring various prefectures and counties in Jiangxi for several months. According to him, the local government is very unhappy with the imperial court's forced suspension of one whip last year, and the people are also suffering from complicated taxes and labor, so please Restore a whip method to collect taxes and services in Jiangxi."

Wei Guangde said in his mouth, got up and handed the memorabilia to Li Chunfang.

"One whip."

Of course, Li Chunfang is not old-fashioned. Last year it was Ge Shouli who insisted on stopping this law because there was a disturbance in Shandong due to the implementation of this law.

At that time, in order to seek stability, after discussing with them, Mr. Xu Ge followed Ge Shouli's proposal. When he played to Emperor Longqing, he also mentioned a lot of flaws in the whipping method, so the court ordered it to stop.

It's just that I didn't expect that in just one year, someone in Jiangxi would request to resume this method.

Li Chunfang didn't express his attitude right away, but looked down at Liu Guangji's memorial, and handed it to Chen Yiqin after reading it.

This matter should have been discussed behind closed doors by the cabinet ministers. Wei Guangde didn't want to bring it up at this time at first, but Ma Sen, Minister of the Household Department, is here to restore a whip method. The person in charge should simply propose it now to see Ma Shangshu's reaction.

"The elders have no budget for relatives, no danger of confiscating property, no danger of bribery and fishing."

Chen Yiqin read it more seriously, and at the end read out the final summary of Liu Guangji's memorial, obviously agreeing with this memorial.

In fact, Wei Guangde did not discuss with Chen Yiqin, Yin Shizhen and others about resuming the one-whip method early in the morning, because he actually knew that the one-whip method can be implemented in most places in the south of the Yangtze River, but there are also some defects. It is really not good for the north, and it needs to be implemented according to local conditions Revise.

But only in Jiangxi, the people really hope to restore the whipping law and simplify the formalities of government taxation.

The resumption of the summer grain and autumn tax this year alone has caused several riots among the people. The people complain that the government has repeatedly collected taxes. The most important thing is the corvee, which is full of complaints among the people.

Corvée is not so easy to serve. Not only do you have to travel far, but you also have to prepare your own food. For many people, being dragged to serve in corvée is actually no different from being sent to death.

They can bear the pain of farming, but it is really difficult to bear the work of those projects. In order to complete the progress quickly, the government basically does not treat the conscripts as human beings, and they are all ordered to do so.

Those who serve in corvee are determined by life and death, riches and honour, and the individual depends on his own fortune.

But it would be different if the government used money to recruit people, at least it would not be possible to use people to death.
Officials deduct wages, naturally they hope that there will be as many people as possible, so that they will have enough oil and water.

If people are exhausted, who will dare to work in the future.

After all, one is to provide unpaid labor to the court, while the other is paid, and the two are fundamentally different.

In Liu Guangji's memorial, he also expressed this in great detail, so that those who have seen it can empathize with them and feel pity for them.

After Chen Yiqin finished reading it, he handed the memorial to Zhang Juzheng silently, and after the cabinet ministers finished reading it, he handed it to Ma Sen.

He is the Minister of the Household Department, and that's what he's in charge of.

Ma Sen also had some difficulties after watching Liu Guangji's memorabilia.

Ge Shouli, the previous Minister of the Ministry of Household Affairs, forced to stop the one whip across the country. Is he going to restore it in his own hands the next year?

In fact, during his time in the household department, he also knew that many people below were very dissatisfied with Ge Shouli's conservative and stubborn, especially when the suspension of one whip was Ge's own wishful thinking, and he did not receive widespread support in the household department.

However, when it comes to major national policies, it is difficult for Ma Sen to express his position now.

After everyone had read it, Wei Guangde said: "After reading Governor Liu's memorandum today, I understand why many places in Jiangxi have been implementing a whip method before and they lived in peace. Approved Governor Liu's memorandum, let Jiangxi resume the implementation of a whipping law."

"Jiangxi is like this, so is Huguang. I have also received requests from Huguang officials many times, hoping to raise this matter in the court."

Zhang Juzheng suddenly interjected at this time, saying that he actually supported Wei Guangde's remarks, and even made use of the topic to implement a whipping method in Huguang.

"Actually, the existence of a whip method in various places also shows that some places are indeed suitable for this method, otherwise the people would not have this appeal."

Li Chunfang was more to the point, saying that there are regional differences in a whip method, some places are suitable, and some places are not.

However, the most critical attitude was not revealed.

"What do you think, Master Ma?"

Chen Yiqin asked.

Ma Sen only hesitated for a moment and said: "This is a big matter, I need to go back to the department to discuss with my subordinates." '

Ma Sen still had some concerns in his heart, and planned to go back to the yamen and call the assistant minister and doctor to discuss before giving his attitude.

After all, it has just been suspended by the Ministry of Accounting for less than a year, and it will be resumed again, which will have a bad impact on the Ministry of Accounting.

The folks and the officialdom would not consider that Ge Shouli had single-handedly promoted this policy, and even encountered great opposition from the Ministry of Household Affairs.

Later, others such as the Ministry of Rites, the Ministry of Officials, and the Ministry of War all had ambiguous attitudes. In fact, this matter has little to do with them. That is, northern officials such as Yang Bo suggested that the northern provinces will not implement it for the time being, and it is best to leave it to the local governments in the south. at your own discretion.

"If this is not the case, let Jiangxi province try it first, and then gradually roll it out according to the results after the implementation. As for the northern region, wait for Jiangxi to improve the system, then choose a province to try it, and implement it slowly.

After the idea of ​​a whip was proposed by the monkey, Liang Cai, the Minister of the Ministry of Household Affairs, compiled and reviewed corvee memorials based on it. Since then, prefectures and counties in various places have tried to collect two taxes with this method. The results are good and bad, but it does not prevent various places from trying .

It can be seen that although this method has disadvantages, it still has merits.

How about the imperial court take this opportunity to try and continuously improve it, so as to customize it for the eternal use of my Ming Dynasty. "

Zhang Juzheng spoke again.

The Monkey King in his mouth refers to Gui E, the second assistant of the cabinet in the early Jiajing Dynasty, who was a Jinshi in the sixth year of Zhengde.

In the early years of Jiajing, he was promoted to the head of the Nanjing Ministry of Criminal Affairs, and entered the imperial court with great gifts.

In the third year of Jiajing, he was promoted to a bachelor of the Imperial Academy. In the fourth year of Jiajing, he was appointed as Zhan Shifu of Zhan Shifu and a bachelor of the Imperial Academy.

In the eighth year of Jiajing and a bachelor of Wuyingdian, he entered the cabinet and participated in the maintenance of the cabinet. After Zhang Cong was the second assistant of the cabinet, he was impeached and made official soon, and was reappointed in the ninth year of Jiajing.

He submitted the "Renmin Kao" to Emperor Jiajing, advocating the implementation of "one whip" and other measures to carry out reforms, but was forced to stop under the obstruction of Yang Yiqing and others, and returned to his hometown in the first month of the tenth year of Jiajing.

The most fundamental reason for his ups and downs in the last days of the officialdom was actually the "Ren Min Kaoshu" he wrote to Emperor Jiajing, which expressed the meaning that almost all the powerful families were most opposed to.

Gui E proposed to re-clear the land in the world, cancel the old method of assigning years of rotation according to the yellow book, and use the rations of a province for the service of a province.

In Guie's taxation reform plan, the equalization of land is a prerequisite for the reform, because the implementation of the one-whip law essentially means dividing the land into mu.

He realized that only by clearing out the deceitful land and registering it in the register, can the court implement the principle of corvée sent by Ding Chanqian.

According to Gui E’s suggestion, Liang Cai, Shangshu of the Ministry of Household Affairs, stipulated a new method of levy: “Together, the ten Jia Ding grains are collected in one li, and the Ding grains in each Li are collected in one prefecture and one county, and the Ding grains in each state and county are collected in one mile.” The government, the food of each government is always in one chief secretary.

And the Chief Secretary will send a province's rations to a province's corvee, and the internal amount will be divided into the number of preferential exemptions. Each grain will be compiled with a certain amount of silver, and each dynasty will be appraised with a certain amount of silver. Order all prefectures, states and counties to obey forever. "

In terms of reform, Gui'e continued the trend of merging tax and service and simplifying complexity, combining various service items into one, and setting them up at one time for small grains, all of which were collected in autumn.

The "economic reform" that Zhang Juzheng pushed after the Wanli Dynasty was actually the essence of Gui E's proposal in "Ren Min Kao Shu" that became reality, that is, clearing the land and implementing the "one-whip method".

The counterattack that Zhang Juzheng encountered after that can be imagined. The political pressure that Gui E faced after playing "Ren Min Kao Shu" was the political pressure from all sides.

His ruling ideology was not implemented, which may be the reason why he was able to die, otherwise his end would be even worse than Zhang Juzheng.

Obviously, Zhang Juzheng is actually Gui E's loyal supporter, he has accomplished what Gui E failed to do.

It's just that he didn't teach good students, and let Emperor Wanli destroy the achievements of the reforms that Daming had made so easily.

People in later generations say that "Ming Shi died in Wanli", but it is not false.

Wei Guangde was not surprised to see Zhang Juzheng so supportive of the implementation of the "One Whip Method", but nodded cheerfully to Zhang Juzheng.

"Yifu, do you have any opinion on Liu Guangji's memorial?"

Li Chunfang asked the second assistant Chen Yiqin again, and wanted to hear his attitude.

"Master Shoufu, I support the trial implementation of this law in Jiangxi. As for whether it should be implemented nationwide, we should wait until Jiangxi implements it."

Chen Yiqin smiled.

"Ma Shangshu, the cabinet does not object to Governor Liu's memorandum. After returning to the cabinet, you can make it clear to your subordinates."

Li Chunfang said to Ma Sen with a smile. (end of this chapter)