Emperor Chongzhen of the Ming Dynasty

Chapter 268 Zheng's Armed Smuggling Group (Part [-])
Seeing the scene where Shang Kexi was quartered by five horses, Zuodu Yushi Chen Chunde retched.

Liu Zongzhou, Shangshu of the Ministry of Rites, grabbed the hand of Hua Yuncheng, the right servant of the Ministry of Officials, and kept shaking.

Jiang Riguang, Shangshu of the Ministry of Punishment, almost fell to the ground while supporting the pillar.

A piece of flesh from Shang Kexi's body fell on the red robe of Yingtian Governor Qu Shixu, and Qu Shixu fainted from fright.

Only military officers and officials who have experienced wars can bear it at this moment, and they can't bear it because Shang Kexi was divided into five horses.

On the contrary, Fan Jingwen, the chief assistant of the cabinet, still acted calmly at this time, although his fists were tightly clenched in his sleeves, there was an enigmatic smile on his face.

Anyone can be frightened at such a time, but he, the chief minister of the cabinet, has to act calmly, otherwise it will not be enough to show the difference from the ministers below.

Zhu Youjian let the important officials with real power in the central and local governments to witness the scene of being divided into corpses by five horses, just to frighten these officials, give them a real impression, and let them know what the fate of treacherous ministers and rebellious sons is.

"This is the ending of betraying me and Daming!"

Zhu Youjian left here in a walking chariot after saying a word.

At this moment, the officials present could not help but tremble.

Only now did they understand why His Majesty let them watch the execution process.

So far, these governors and even the hall officials of the central government temple did not dare to raise any objections to the tax collection work after returning to the Yamen, and no one directly said that the tax collection was wrong or sloppy.

Even Zheng Zhilong, the commander-in-chief of Fujian, had to believe in the determination of His Majesty Zhu Youjian.

Although the tax registration a few years ago was vigorous, it was limited to the industrial registration of shops, workshops and minerals on land, because Zhu Youjian did not force tax collection, only for registration, and the Zheng family's business model was to collect protection fees at sea and port collection Mainly engaged in shore fees and smuggling at home and abroad, and did not participate in shop management and workshop production.

Therefore, the impact of Zhu Youjian's tax increase on the Zheng Group is not great.

At most, it will only increase the cost of tea, silk and porcelain smuggled by the Zheng Group from China.

But what really had a big impact on his Zheng family was the so-called sea trade tax in the tariff.

Although most of the wealth of his Zheng family comes from maritime trade and protection fees collected at sea checkpoints, the imperial court can't control him, but a large part of his wealth comes from the smuggling trade along the coast. In the Ming Dynasty's import and export trade, there is a lot of profit.

Now that the imperial court wants to rectify the customs duties, this is the only thing that Zheng Zhilong can imagine will affect the Zheng family.

If the imperial court wants to capture more income from overseas trade, it will crack down on smuggling, which will force the Zheng Group to give up this part of the benefits to the imperial court.

Years ago, the tax registration did not register the total amount of imports and exports, because it could not be registered, and most of the smuggled goods were controlled by his Zheng family. No court official dared to come to his Zheng family to inquire about how much profit the Zheng family made from buying and selling in a year.

Zheng Zhilong didn't know how much tariffs the imperial court had to collect before he was satisfied. Now the imperial court could only grasp the amount that should be levied by merchants in the mainland. His Zheng family had not even received a tax bill until now. This made Zheng Zhilong very puzzled. He didn't know that His Majesty Zhu Is Youjian ignoring his Zheng family on purpose, or is he waiting for some other means? Zheng Zhilong wants to find out what His Majesty and the court think, whether he really wants to crack down on smuggling, or restart the sea ban and only implement the tribute system?
Because of this, when Zhu Youjian issued an order to order the governors and soldiers from all over the country to enter Beijing, he also came.

Although some people in his Zheng Group were worried that the court would use this to get rid of him, he believed that the court would not be able to kill him before it had enough power to destroy him.

"Your Majesty has a decree to announce that Zheng Zhilong, the commander in chief of Fujian Province, will enter the palace for an audience!"

At this time, Wang Chengen found Zheng Zhilong and conveyed Zhu Youjian's will.

For the Zheng Group, Zhu Youjian is also a headache.

Now, on the surface, Zheng Zhilong is a military attache who is only in charge of Fujian's military defense.

But in fact, he, Zheng Zhilong, is the largest smuggling armed group along the coast of Fujian. He used to be called a pirate and now he is recruited by Ming, so he can only be called a smuggling armed group. Moreover, this armed group has become the official army of the Ming Dynasty and can be used by the court. Merge other pirates in name to consolidate its maritime supremacy.

The biggest profit of ocean trade comes from the collection of import and export trade taxes.

If Zhu Youjian wants to increase the tariff quota, he can only attack smuggling groups first.

With Zhu Youjian's current control over military power, control over the gentry group, and prestige among the people, it is not a problem to crack down on smuggling groups within the control of the imperial court.

However, the maritime strength of the Zheng Group is not something that Zhu Youjian can easily touch, but the Zheng Group's collection of protection fees for import and export ships has already affected the court's customs revenue, not to mention that he himself is also involved in smuggling, and he is still the big head of the smuggling trade. .

From a certain point of view, the Zheng Group is now a navy that belongs to the imperial court in name, but in fact it is a warlord who monopolizes the marine economy at sea.

What Zhu Youjian worried about was that once he began to formally levy tariffs according to the production of tea shreds and other products according to the court's taxation statistics, the warlord would become pirates to sabotage tax collection, continue to smuggle wildly, not use official trade channels, and conceal trade income, making the The actual tax revenue collected by the imperial court will still be very small.

In addition, the Zheng Group can also transfer its own trade losses after the tariff collection to the protection fees levied on passing ships, which will increase the cost of import and export goods and affect the overall ocean trade sales.

Zhu Youjian had to admit that Zheng's group had many ways to deal with it, but he himself had no way to deal with Zheng's group.

Unless he can eliminate Zheng's group, or Zheng Zhilong can willingly give up the sea control and most of the maritime interests to the imperial court.

But no matter what, Zhu Youjian knew that he could not provoke the Zheng Group now. Although he now had the army power that could compete with the Manchu Qing, he did not yet have the naval power that could compete with the Zheng Group.

Fortunately, the Zheng Group did not have the purpose of plotting a great Ming Dynasty. At most, it wanted to maintain the status quo, that is, to be promoted, to be promoted, to be honored, to be extremely rich, and to be a Han influence, and Zhu Youjian also knew that Zheng Zhilong was a person who had no vision and ambitions. Roughly speaking, in the original history, a governor of Fujian and Zhejiang voted for the Qing Dynasty, and ended up being killed.

In this life, Zhu Youjian didn't think that Zheng Zhilong would become a big hit. The reason why he proposed to impose tariffs a year ago but exempted them for one year was to test Zheng Zhilong.

If Zheng Zhilong had united with the ministers of the DPRK and China or the pirates to launch an attack, Zhu Youjian might have stopped collecting tariffs, but at that time Zheng Zhilong didn't know whether he was attracted by his position as the commander-in-chief, or he was hesitant. Anger the imperial court and see the imperial court's next plan, or wait for the outcome of the war between Ming and Qing.

Since the collection of tariffs cannot bypass the Zheng Group, Zhu Youjian can only call Zheng Zhilong to the imperial court to discuss and discuss. Although he is now the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty, but he does not have a navy under his own control, so he can only deal with it first. Zheng Zhilong reached a compromise, and even had to rely on the Zheng Group to strengthen the imperial navy.

　Sorry for the late update, there will be three chapters tonight! ! !

　　
　
(End of this chapter)