Haisheng Mingdi

Chapter 603 Promise
Golden autumn October.

On the land of Qilu, the sun and moon flags were held high, and the Ming army marched in multiple directions, encircling the cities of Xu, Yan, Dongchang, Jining, and Jinan.

In this battle, the five armies of the imperial battalion headquarters, except the former four towns stationed in Liaodong and Liaoxi, the other four armies and the two towns in the Beijing camp were basically mobilized.

Even the emperor arrived in the iron city of Zichuan quietly.

The emperor let the Jingying Fengtian Town stay in Tokyo, and he led Jinwu, Habayashi, and Qianniu to station in Zichuan, with Yongwei Town in the north and Zhongsu Town in the south.

After Zhu Yihai entered Zichuan, the three towns of the imperial camp quickly sealed off the surrounding areas.

The emperor is quite calm. This autumn offensive is a strategic counter-offensive planned by the Shaotian Dynasty for two years. However, it has been prepared for so long, and everything that needs to be prepared is also ready. The advance is also very beautiful. Not daring to fight, and retreating again and again, it is obviously an offensive and defensive siege battle in which they want to defend the city and resist to the end.

Zhu Yihai also summoned local gentry, ordinary people, and representatives of industry and commerce, etc., and visited Banyang Academy on purpose.Zichuan City was famous all over the country under the headline report of the Fuxing Daily, and the Beijing News and other major newspapers followed up, and they promoted it as a righteous town and a good place.

However, after going around in person, I found that the place is really doing well, the place is peaceful and peaceful, and the business and industry are quite vibrant.

It is not an exaggeration to say that the four people enjoy their careers.

Even if the army crossed the border and entered, it did not disturb the local order or disrupt the lives of the people, especially the prices were relatively stable and the supply was quite sufficient.

There are more than 1000 students in Banyang Academy.

The Shizi Street in the city is very lively, and there are constant businessmen on the official roads and docks.

In the grain stations in counties and townships, there is grain purchased from the central government.

All townships also built new righteous warehouses. Although Gu Xianshou is a member of the Donglin Party and likes to engage in party disputes, he still has practical skills. In other words, the county government team that came with him from Fengtian is not bad.At the beginning of the year, Zhu Yihai ordered the abolition of the tradition of officials recruiting and appointing masters and staff.

Instead, new official positions were set up at all levels of yamen to replace these masters, and they were transferred from private staff to state officials.

Gu Xian received the county magistrate, so he didn't bring his masters such as Xingming, Qiangu, Shuqi, etc., because the imperial court sent him several public officials as section chiefs, who were in charge of Xingming, Qiangu, etc. Staff transferred to public office.

Originally, since the Ming Dynasty, the group of masters has been an important source of official corruption.

Folks say that there are three elders in the yamen, the old official, the old Mu, and the old Xu, who are always greedy, cunning, and treacherous, and they are in cahoots with corrupt officials.

It is a huge burden for an official to invite several masters. The masters are only the private staff of the official, and the court cannot restrain them, but they can act on behalf of the official and act recklessly.

To put it bluntly, these masters in the Ming Dynasty were similar to the eunuchs and slaves of the Ming emperor. What problems did the eunuchs have, and what problems did the masters also have.

The master directly represents the officials, so in a county government, no one cares about the master of the county magistrate.

Now the new policy abolishes masters, and the imperial court sets up several general cases such as criminal names and money valleys in each yamen, and each person is appointed as the section chief. The official public officials paid by the imperial court are not only subject to the discipline of the state law, but also subject to the supervision of the performance examination. .

On the other hand, Zhu Yihai is also promoting the separation of the judiciary. He has set up the chief of the judicial department in the province, and set up local bureaus below. To recruit and train new types of judicial talents.

Even accounting and other professional schools were established to train these specialized financial and accounting officials to enrich the local tax bureaus and audit bureaus.

When Gu Xianshou came to Zichuan to take up his post, he was assigned by the whole team, except for the county magistrate, county magistrate, master book, and the teaching and administrative officials.

According to the usual practice, Gu Xianshou is the chief official, and the county magistrate and the chief secretary are the secondary officials. They are in charge of food, water conservancy and river defense, etc., and they all have their own yamen, which work in separate yamen.

The eighth grade of the county magistrate and the ninth grade of the master book.

The eight grades of teaching and instruction are academic officials, who are in charge of education and county schools.

There are also some miscellaneous jobs in the county, such as the patrol inspector of the inspection department, the station postman, the warehouse ambassador, the deputy envoy of the Hebo Office, the deputy envoy of the Approval Office, etc.

Miscellaneous jobs have their own specialties, but they are all under the leadership of the official.

There are also some miscellaneous jobs that do not even have a salary, such as medical officers, onmyoji, Sengzhengsihui, Daozhengsihui, etc. They are listed in the government and belong to specialized technical personnel, and they need to rely on their professional expertise to make a living.

In the county government office, the pawns are responsible for specific affairs, and there are six rooms under it. In fact, there are more than six rooms.

The pawns are not of high status, but they have great authority in the yamen.

There is a large group of guards in the county government. In large counties, there are thousands or even thousands of people. They are divided into two parts. One part is three classes, the strong class, the soap class, and the fast class.Some of them serve as county magistrates, and they can be subdivided into seven departments, namely, sending and receiving, attendant, accounting, front draft, waiting draft, class management, and on duty.

In addition, there are Kuzi, Canglao, Douji, Menzi, Jinzi, Cook and Tavern Fu and so on.

Although a county government office is not big, it is still small and complete, and the number of various officials and servants is astonishing. Their wages and expenses are actually the largest financial expenditures in ancient places.

After local expropriation of land and land, the retention is often not enough for expenditure, so it can only be apportioned in various ways.

When Gu Xianshou took office, he brought along several high-ranking officials, even miscellaneous jobs with no rank and salary, just a few professional unpaid medical officers, monk officials, etc. did not bring.

And the pawns, Liufang scribes, Xingming, and Qiangu Chief Case Section Chief also brought them.

It can be said that the entire Zichuan county government office has basically been completely replaced. Even the third shift leader and the Liufang Book Office have been re-evaluated, and many people have been replaced.

Gu Xianshou was able to achieve amazing results in such a short period of time in Zichuan. In fact, apart from the good external environment, he also owed it to his new team.

Generally, county magistrates are newcomers, many of them are inexperienced and have to deal with these treacherous subordinates in the local area, so they are often deceived by them.

They are not familiar with the business, and often they can only rely on the master, and some officials have to be deceived by the master.

So after taking office, it may not be a year or so, and he may not even know the details of the county.

But now he is appointed by the whole team, backed by the imperial camp, and Xie Qian helped him kill people and establish his prestige, Gu Xianshou can do everything very easily. The officials have made up for the shortfalls accumulated, so that they have food and money in their hands, and they don’t have to worry about doing anything.

Zhu Yihai inspected Zichuan City, the city walls were repaired, the moat was dredged, even the trees on the street were pruned, and many public toilets were added in the city.

The compilation and training of Baojia is also very well implemented, ten households have one Jia, ten Jia have one card, all kinds of household registration information are clearly registered on the sign, and the three shifts in the county are also very neat and energetic.

During this kind of war, there was not a single beggar or refugee in or outside the city of Zichuan, and there were no refugee shacks, and they were all resettled and diverted.

There are no barren fields or dilapidated villages outside the city, everything is orderly and full of vitality.

Even the number of mines in the mountains has increased, and the business of workshops has become more prosperous. It is hard to imagine that this was an actual border, or even a clearing control area not long ago.

Da Jia, a powerful local gentry and powerful landlord, was apprehensive and apprehensive when he was summoned by the emperor. As a result, the emperor was very enthusiastic about them and publicly praised their righteous deeds.

Zhang Erniu, a small self-cultivator, was also received by the emperor as a representative of farmers. He and more than 100 farmers, tenants, vendors, craftsmen, and fellows met with the emperor. The emperor gave them tea and snacks, chatted with them all morning, and asked them Many questions.

Zhang Erniu was very old, excited and nervous, but when faced with the emperor's roll call, although he stuttered, he still said everything he could think of. The emperor even took a pen to record and gave him one by one. Reply.

The question raised by Zhang Erniu is actually what all farmers are concerned about, that is, the current tax of two buckets per mu, and then two liters per mu, plus two liters and two combined heat consumption, is it a permanent system?

Is it true that adding children and never adding gifts?

Is there really no apportionment and levy anymore?

"That's right, people multiply, but there will never be more gifts. I, Zhu Yihai, will issue a custom. Tian Fu, Ding Yin, and Huo Consumption will always be the same number, and there will be no additional Ding Gong, Ding Yin, additional, Conscript these."

Zhang Erniu's face was flushed, and he was as excited as when he got married back then, "But what if the county doesn't have enough money to do things, such as repairing rivers and roads, or the county's servants don't have enough money for food and money, and the county post station doesn't have enough money? The reception fee is not enough, and the horses and silver are not enough, so there will be no more apportionment?"

"I can tell old man Zhang that customization is customization, and the burden on farmers will be these in the future, and will never be added. If the government's expenditure is not enough, or the local government's expenditure is not enough, no matter what project needs to be repaired, or the envoy's money is not enough, I will not ask for it again. Peasant plus pie."

"What if it's not enough?" Zhang Erniu asked everyone's heartfelt thoughts. The court has no money, and the government has no money. It's not like the common people who pay more taxes.
Zhu Yihai smiled and told everyone that the income of farmers is limited, and the current taxation of two buckets, four liters and two combined per mu, although it is said that after converting the tax mu, the upper, middle and lower fields, and the various sizes of mu, are all converted into standard tax mu There will be no tax rate for both good land and bad land. For good land, three stones will be collected for two buckets and four liters for two, and for poor fields, eight buckets will be charged, and two buckets will be charged for four liters.

The current tax rate, under normal harvests, is about ten to one, or even twelve to three to one.In Zhu Yihai's opinion, this tax rate is actually not low.

At the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, the Taizu custom made a tax of [-] yuan for farmers, which was only a few liters of grain per mu. However, compared with the present, the previous tax of [-] yuan is actually only a partial burden, and the big part is slavery, and there are many other additional levies. , So by the Chongzhen Dynasty, the actual burden of many farmers had reached [-] to [-]%, and they could not survive in the event of a famine, especially when they had to bear joint taxes.

Now Zhu Yihai said that no matter what the situation is, farmers only need to pay two buckets and four liters per mu of land, which is still taxed per mu.

Everyone really couldn't believe it.

"The imperial court will fix the agricultural tax and the fixed land to ensure that the burden on the farmers is not high and they can have enough food and clothing. As for state expenditures and local expenditures, there will also be industrial and commercial taxes, special taxes on salt, tea, tobacco, alcohol and mines, customs duties, and donations. In order to supplement, even the country has supplementary fiscal revenues such as handicrafts, trade, and shopping.

In case of some emergencies, such as additional war military expenditures, catastrophe and epidemic expenses, the imperial court can also issue bonds to raise funds from the people and borrow money at interest.When the situation improves in the future, the debt will be repaid slowly. "

Even some other taxes will be added in the future, such as vehicle and vessel tax, resource tax, property tax, etc. Like the current land deed tax, there are many taxes that can be levied, provided that they are reasonable.

To reduce the agricultural tax, especially to cancel the poll tax, it is necessary to collect taxes according to assets, transactions, income, etc.

It is simple and convenient to only pay attention to the collection of farmers, and levy per mu and head, but it is actually extremely unreasonable. If you want to collect more and more reasonable taxes, you have to go to industrial and commercial, resource and other places.

If it doesn’t work, you can still issue bonds. Reasonable issuance of bonds is actually very necessary, and any country in the future will issue bonds.

What's more, in addition to tax collection, there are other channels for national income, such as selling land and mines, and income from national operations.

Zhang Erniu and other old farmers didn't understand this, but they all smiled happily when they got the emperor's personal assurance that farmers would only be charged so much for farming in the future.

Although they may not believe it all, they think that this policy will not change for at least one day when the emperor is in power, and maybe new policies will be issued when the new emperor succeeds in the future. If they can live another three or forty years, then they will have three or forty years of good life.

Zhang Erniu even secretly thought that it would be great if the emperor could live to be a hundred years old, so that the peasants could have six or seventy years of good life.

(End of this chapter)