Daming Yuanfu

Chapter 2212 Prime Minister ([-]) "Cleaning Up" of the Cabinet

Gao pragmatically bid farewell to the emperor and returned to the cabinet.Just as he was about to enter the main room, he saw an official in his thirties, wearing a green robe and embroidered with white pheasants, standing at the gate with his hands solemn.Gao Jingshi was confused and wanted to take a closer look, but he saw that the green-robed official had already taken the initiative to come forward and said, "Your Majesty, Li Zhizao, has been ordered to come and clean Yuan Fu's pen."

Only then did Gao Pragmatic remember that because Xiong Tingbi, the Jinshi of Guanzheng beside him, had been sent abroad and there was no one available around him, Chen Yubi, the Minister of Personnel, had already asked him in private and asked him which young man he wanted to have around him. At that time, Gao Pragmatic took the initiative to name Li Zhizao.

But there is a new word here, which is what Li Zhizao just called "washing the pen for Yuan Fu". How new is the term "pen-washing"?The answer is that it only appeared after Gao pragmatic became the first assistant.

Or in other words, Li Zhizao was the first person in the Ming Dynasty who was seriously called a "pen washer".However, please note that "washing pens" is not a formal official position, just like the chief minister of the cabinet is not a formal prime minister. The word "washing pens" was passively coined due to the pragmatic habits of today's capital officialdom.

This book has made some descriptions of "what is a prime minister" a long time ago, and adopted the mainstream definition of later generations: "According to the history of the prime minister in our country for more than 2000 years, it must meet two conditions, one of which is indispensable. That is, it must have deliberation power. , and must have the power to supervise the execution of hundreds of officials.”

Why start here?Because in the late Ming Dynasty, several chief ministers of the cabinet were so powerful that they gave people the illusion that the chief ministers were really variations of the prime minister, but this conclusion is actually untrue.

According to the above definition, in short, in addition to having the power to discuss political decisions, the prime minister must also have the power to supervise the execution of officials.The first point goes without saying, because the issue of voting has been emphasized many times in this book.Here we focus on the second point, which is the so-called power to supervise the execution of officials.

This qualification is very important. If there is no second restriction standard, then almost anyone who can influence the emperor's decision-making and have the power to make suggestions on military affairs can be called a prime minister. This is obviously not consistent with the facts.

Looking back at history, the prime ministerial institutions before the Tang Dynasty were roughly the Prime Minister's Office in the Western Han Dynasty, the Sangong's Office in the Eastern Han Dynasty, and the Shangshutai in the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties.They all have a common feature. Both the Prime Minister's Palace and the Three Dukes can open offices and appoint officials and subordinates. There are many departments and officials under the Prime Minister's agency (all of which are part of the national formal establishment). Whether it is the Prime Minister's Palace, the Three Dukes' Palace or the Shangshutai, among others It is a huge administrative agency in itself, and the prime minister is the head of the administrative agency.

Talking about the prime minister should not just be limited to the prime minister himself, but also need to focus on the administrative agency where the prime minister is located.The so-called "power to supervise the execution of hundreds of officials" under the Shangshu Province system is to command and supervise local governments through Shangshu Fu; under the Zhongshu Menxia system, it is to command the world's Jieduguan and other state capitals through ultimatums.

During the Kaiyuan period of the Tang Dynasty, Zhang Shuo changed the political affairs hall to the Zhongshu Gate. There were five rooms under the Zhongshu Gate: the first was the official room, the second was the cardinal room, the third was the military room, the fourth was the household room, and the fifth was the punishment room. Take charge of all affairs.The Zhongshu Menxia system lasted from the Kaiyuan Dynasty to the Yuanfeng Reform in the Northern Song Dynasty.

After the Yuanfeng restructuring, the three-province system was restored, and after the Southern Song Dynasty, the one-province system was restored. Whether it was the Shangshu Province in the Jin Dynasty or the Zhongshu Province in the Yuan Dynasty, the prime ministerial institutions of the feudal dynasty relied on the government and the three provinces (see Zhongshu Menxia System). Chengdu is a special "one province system") and operates.These government offices and the three provinces all have a large number of Caosi (or so-and-so offices) and other agencies that specifically deal with general affairs, which is the same as the so-and-so ministries under the Imperial Court in later generations.

But here comes the key. The relationship between the cabinet of the Ming Dynasty and the Six Ministries was not the relationship between the provinces and the Six Ministries under the Shangshu Du-Provincial System, because the cabinet did not have any relevant functional departments that could interface with the Six Ministries. The so-called " "The cabinet leads the six ministries" has always been an unfair name.

Moreover, the cabinet cannot direct the local government through edicts like the Minister of Secretariat and the subordinates of Zhongshu through edicts. This has been mentioned many times before. The chief minister often needs to rely on private letters, that is, letters to tell local officials what to do. .This involves a problem, that is, if the local official does not listen, at least in theory, the chief minister cannot convict him for it - you are just communicating with me in private, and it is not an administrative order, why should I listen?

It can be seen from this that the chief minister of the Ming Dynasty's cabinet looks more like the prime minister than the prime minister. His "prime ministerial power" lacks institutional confirmation and corresponding administrative agencies. He is just a lame prime minister.However, the problem is that even judging from the development of later generations, the function of "administrative head" cannot be absent.No matter how powerful your imperial power is, the emperor himself cannot do this job well. He must have a leader in the bureaucracy.

Gao Jingshi was determined to change this, but he knew very well that such a major event could not be accomplished overnight, otherwise if Liubu or others jumped out to use Zhu Yuanzhang's words to criticize him, Gao Yuanfu's face would not look good.

His train of thought was still consistent, proceeding step by step, with smaller movements at first, and then slowly increasing the firepower like boiling a frog in warm water.

He first used Xiong Tingbi as the first step to test.Before Gao Jingshi became the first assistant, Guanzheng Jinshi's work in the cabinet... To express his feelings directly was to serve tea and water, literally.

It can be said that Guanzheng Jinshi simply "takes a look" around the elders. In rare cases-for example, the elder you are with likes you, then maybe they will pay attention to some less important things. The exam school generally asks you to consult in detail, which is basically the extreme.Therefore, the "Guanzheng Jinshi" of "Guanzheng Jinshi" is more about your qualifications, which proves that the cabinet has certain recognition of you, and you are regarded as one of the "preserver prime ministers".

Gao Pragmatic's use of Xiong Tingbi obviously broke this convention.When Xiong Tingbi served as "Gao Yuanfu's Jinshi", he often represented Gao Yuanfu to the Sixth Ministry, the Metropolitan Procuratorate and other yamen to convey Yuanfu's wishes, and even had the right to explain Gao Yuanfu's orders to a certain extent. Replenish.This is very unusual, far beyond the comparison of the past Guanzheng Jinshi.

Obviously, Xiong Tingbi, as a highly pragmatic Jinshi scholar, has the characteristics of a "chief assistant secretary" to a certain extent.Shortly afterwards, Xiong Tingbi's term as a political guanshi ended, and Gao pragmatically arranged for him to enter the Metropolitan Procuratorate, and then he was directly sent out to patrol Gansu. This period was also very important, because it also set a precedent.

There is no need to elaborate on the power of the patrol commissioner. Xiong Tingbi immediately took up the post of patrol commissioner after observing the administration. This kind of "high reuse" only happened to one person before him, that is, Gao Pragmatic himself.

The outside world has already made some speculations about this, but the fact is that their speculations are not wrong. Gao Pragmatic's purpose in doing this is to deliberately improve the status of "chief assistant secretary", which is not an actual position, in the minds of outsiders.

With this foreshadowing, the next step is for Gao Pragmatic to no longer select someone from a new Jinshi with no actual position as his "secretary", but to select a low-level official who has recently served as his "secretary" - such as Li Zhizao this time.

Li Zhizao and Xiong Tingbi were actually in the same year. Both of them were Jinshi in the 26th year of Wanli. Moreover, Li Zhizao's joint examination results were far better than Xiong Tingbi: Xiong Tingbi was born in the same Jinshi class of No. 115 in the top three, but Li Zhizao was born in the No. 5 Jinshi in the second class.

Because of this, Xiong Tingbi could only rely on his good performance in the imperial examination to become a common scholar, while Li Zhizao directly transferred his official position to other places: he was awarded the post of Wailang, a member of the camp and maintenance department of the Nanjing Ministry of Industry.

This time, Li Zhizao's return to Beijing was naturally directly named by Gao pragmatism, but in officialdom, there must be some high-sounding reason.Li Zhizao was a Jinshi in the 26th year of Wanli. Now he is only in the 28th year of Wanli. He has not yet reached the "three-year exam". How can he be transferred without any reason?
However, now that Gao Yuanfu had spoken, the official Chen Tianguan had to find some reason to come out. In the end, Li Zhizao's transfer order became like this: "...it was found that this person has excelled in his job in two years, and that he is good at calendar calculation, He studied counting and other studies, and with the talent requested by Yuan Fu, he was transferred back to the capital and served as a member of the household department, Wai Lang, and served as an servant in Wenyuan Pavilion."

This paragraph is the most useful paragraph in the official letter of the Ministry of Personnel. It explains several things: first, Li Zhizao performed well during his tenure; but Li Zhizao is good at calendar and mathematics; third, he named Gao Pragmatic and proactively proposed to recruit talents in calendar and mathematics; The fourth is that Li Zhizao's position level has not changed, but he has returned from the Nanjing Ministry of Industry to the Beijing Ministry of Household Affairs; the fifth is the most critical: "Serving as an errand in Wenyuan Pavilion".

Among the cabinet bachelors there is a "Wenyuan Pavilion grand master", but he is only ranked No. 5 among the ordinary palace masters.The "entering Wenyuan Pavilion as a servant" here is because the location of the cabinet is in Wenyuan Pavilion, which actually means entering the cabinet as a servant.

It should be noted that serving officials, especially those in the Six Ministries, entered Wenyuan Pavilion to "attend", which was unprecedented in the Ming Dynasty.The reason was just mentioned. The Ming Dynasty’s cabinet did not have subordinate divisions and subordinate officials, and theoretically—that is, under the order of Zhu Yuanzhang to dismiss the prime minister—there should not be!

Now Gao pragmatic has set a precedent. He first transferred Li Zhizao to the household department, which he also controlled, and then ordered him to serve as a servant in the cabinet. He was obviously deliberately breaking some conventions.Considering Gao Pragmatic's many past performances, the official circles in the capital will never be indifferent to this, and will naturally try to figure out Gao Yuanfu's intentions.Therefore, for some reason, the "officer" around Yuan Fu was given a very nice nickname: "Wash the Pen".

Why is it "washing pens"?Probably because the cabinet has the power to draw up votes, and the cabinet elder who is responsible for drafting the votes that day will call it "writing", and Gao Jingshi is the first assistant, and there is no one in Beijing who can equal Gao Jingshi in terms of power, then It is assumed that the power of "writing" in the cabinet is completely exercised by Gao Pragmatic, and he is the only one who truly "writes".

Since Gao pragmatically writes the pen, aren't the officials who help him just "wash the pen"?After Yuan Fu wrote and drafted the draft, you came to help wash the pen. You were really just a slap in the face!
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PS: I caught a cold two days ago. I thought it was because I got cold while sleeping while typing that night, but later I found something was wrong. I went to the health room for a checkup and found out that it was mycoplasma infection... Now my head still hurts a little, or maybe it doesn’t hurt. Anyway, I just feel dizzy and swollen. swell.This chapter is yesterday's, 3K, and the chapter that should be updated tonight, I'll see if I can work overtime in the middle of the night.

(End of this chapter)