Brother Zhu Youxiao

Chapter 648 The new man wins the old man

Inside the capital, the outer court, and the Wenhua Palace...

When these three place names appeared, the cabinet ministers from the 23rd year of the Apocalypse had already gathered, and today is September 53th, and there are [-] days left before the day when King Qi became a vassal.

On the left and right of the long table, the six ministers sat separately, and the atmosphere was silent. It was not until Hong Chengchou walked into the hall and sat in the main seat that the frozen atmosphere was relieved.

The reason why they are like this is because on the first day of September, Zhu Ciran once again reorganized Daming according to his own needs.

This restructuring involves many people, and the content of the restructuring is the complete separation of the cabinet and the six ministries.

When mentioning the cabinet system, it is necessary to mention the very important relationship between prime minister and monarchy in the political system.

After Zhu Yuanzhang established the Ming Dynasty in the early Ming Dynasty, he believed: "Since ancient times, the three princes have discussed Taoism, and the six ministers have divided their duties. There has never been a prime minister. Since the Qin Dynasty, a prime minister has been installed, and they have not followed suit. Because of this, although there are virtuous ministers in the Han, Tang, and Song Dynasties, However, during the period, there were many villains, authoritarian and chaotic politics..."

In the 13th year of Hongwu, Zhu Yuanzhang took the Prime Minister Hu Weiyong's case as an opportunity to order the abolition of the prime minister system established since the Qin Dynasty.

This approach strengthened the imperial power and facilitated the centralized handling of affairs, but it was also likely to lead to the concentration of government affairs and make the emperor unable to do what he wanted.

In order to solve this new contradiction, in the 15th year of Hongwu, Zhu Yuanzhang set up the Grand Scholars of Zhudiange to receive memorials, wholesale manuscripts, and assist the emperor in handling government affairs, but did not participate in decision-making.

In the early years of Yongle, Zhu Di inherited his father's will, and selected the Imperial Academy for editing, lectures, etc. to enter the Wenyuan Pavilion, and participated in the maintenance, which was called the cabinet, and the cabinet system was formed.

At this time, the cabinet was only the emperor's private secretary, and the rank of the cabinet's non-commissioned officers was also low, only the fifth rank, and his status in the court was not too high, and the cabinet was only equivalent to the emperor's adviser.

However, as the dynasty gradually stabilized, the need to process more than 200 memorials every day almost exhausted most of the emperor's energy.

In addition, the emperor in the early Ming Dynasty had to go to court three times a day. Therefore, except for the good physical fitness of Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang and Zhu Di, as long as the physical fitness of other descendants is slightly poor, and it is linked to diligence, it will inevitably be difficult to live long.

Diligent emperors don't live long, and those who live long don't live long.

Under such circumstances, the direct result was that there were too many young emperors in the Ming Dynasty.

Such as Zhu Qizhen, Zhu Houzhao, Zhu Yijun, Zhu Youxiao, Zhu Youjian and others are like this.

Therefore, when the emperor was young, the cabinet often handled state affairs on behalf of the emperor, and it was against this background that they gradually grasped greater power.

However, during the period of Zhu Yuanzhang, the Diange University Scholars were only consultants.

As for Zhu Di, although he restored the Grand Master of the Hongwu period after he ascended the throne, none of the first batch of cabinet ministers entered the cabinet as a Grand Master of the Palace, and after entering the cabinet, only some of them were promoted to a certain level. Palace or a scholar of a certain pavilion.

At the beginning, they only participated in the maintenance of Wenyuan Pavilion as editors and other officials, which were called the cabinet, and gradually they became bachelors and Zhan Shifu, and their power was not too great.

The power of the cabinet is that since the first year of Hongxi, the task of counseling has been heavy, and it has been promoted to teacher security, minister, minister, and envoy, and is still a bachelor and a bachelor.

However, since Zhu Di set up a cabinet, not all cabinet ministers were able to obtain the title of a scholar of a certain hall or a certain cabinet.

During this period, cabinet ministers such as Xie Jin, Hu Yan, Ma Yu, Cao Nai, Miao Zhong, Yin Zhi, etc. did not receive the title of Royal Grand Scholars for life.

This situation lasted until the end of Chenghua, basically one-third of the Ming Dynasty, when the imperial power was greater.

Such a cabinet system has its advantages and disadvantages. The advantage is to share the administrative pressure of the emperor and perform some of the functions of the prime minister of Zhongshu.

Since Ming Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang abolished the prime minister, the emperor also served as a prime minister, and the heavy tasks in the middle are unimaginable.

The highly centralized rule requires the emperor to devote a lot of energy to it, and the cabinet uses the rights of drafting bills and formulating imperial edicts to command various ministries under the guise of imperial power. At the same time, it did not violate the "Emperor Ming Zu Xun".

When the "articles" system in the later period of Xuanzong appeared, the cabinet played the role of "participating in the affairs of the government" and helping the emperor handle administrative affairs.

After Emperor Yingzong ascended the throne, all Chinese and foreign memorials were entrusted to the cabinet to sign and execute.

The existence of the cabinet system can be said to have strengthened the autocratic monarchy in the Ming Dynasty. After all, after the abolition of the prime minister, six departments were in charge of common affairs, and major issues were decided by the court council presided over by the minister.

However, after the formation of the cabinet system, the chief assistant relied on the emperor to command the six ministries, and the rights of the six ministries were gradually eroded.

Since the cabinet can only be attached to the emperor, expanding the power of the cabinet is also expanding the power of the emperor.

Politics is actually a cycle. After the prime minister was abolished, the political struggle continued to be intertwined between the Chinese and foreign courts, the emperor and the cabinet, the cabinet and the six ministries, the emperor and the Chinese court, and so on.

But as the core of the centralized system, the emperor is mostly in the role of controller.

It was not until Hongzhi years that a new situation suddenly appeared in the temple, and this situation was broken.

During the Hongzhi period, no matter what position the cabinet ministers entered Zhiwenyuan Pavilion, they could finally obtain the title of Dian Ge University Bachelor, and gradually formed the situation that officials at all levels first added the title of Dian Ge University Bachelor before entering the cabinet.

After the opening of this opening, if you can't get rid of your official rank with the rank of Grand Bachelor, it will be regarded as abnormal by all officials.

This head seemed nothing at the time, but the power and responsibilities of the cabinet ministers reached their peak. Finally, in the eighth year of Hongzhi, there was a phenomenon that the cabinet ministers were also recommended by the court.

Ting Tui, which was the main method of selecting ministers in the Ming Dynasty, was not applicable to cabinet ministers before the eighth year of Hongzhi.

The cause of this incident was the lack of members in the cabinet, so Emperor Xiaozong Zhu Youtang of the Ming Dynasty ordered the court to promote cabinet ministers in the same way as other ministers were promoted by the court, so the Ministry of Officials joined forces with the Six Ministries, the Metropolitan Procuratorate, the Department of General Affairs, Dali Temple and the Kedao officials. Six ministers were elected, and finally the emperor selected Li Dongyang and Xie Qian to join the cabinet.

Since the court recommendation was jointly recommended by the Ministry of Officials, the Jiuqing, and Ke Dao, and the elected ministers were often prestigious ministers, the scholar-bureaucrats in the Ming Dynasty attached great importance to the court recommendation, and believed that only the positions obtained through the court recommendation were reasonable and legal. .

In their view, the special briefing method in which the emperor directly appointed cabinet ministers was a disadvantage and had no advantages at all.

Therefore, since the beginning of the eighth year of Hongzhi, the appointment by the emperor's central decree or the promotion by the cabinet will cause a lot of discussions. Often the officials appointed by the emperor's special briefing will not take up the post. It's a shame to be assigned a job.

After a long time, the emperor lost the power to directly appoint cabinet ministers and be trusted by hundreds of officials. Officials who were directly assigned were often discriminated against by their peers, and the emperor directly lost a card that he could play directly.

Although such a cabinet system avoids the chance of autocratic ministers appearing, and the selection system is relatively open, the imperial power is not as great as before.

In addition, the existence of Tingtui needs to canvass votes, so such a system has gradually evolved into a cradle of cliques.

If the cabinet ministers wanted to gain power, they had to make friends with the internal eunuch on the one hand, and on the other hand they had to squeeze out fellow academicians, which turned into a calamity for cronies.

For example, Yan Song was the first assistant, and he was very authoritative, but he was overwhelmed by Xu Jie, a member of the cabinet.

Zhang Juzheng served as the chief assistant, and because Feng Baofang, the chief inspector of ceremonies, was able to do what he wanted and formed cronies, he could exercise power. However, when the reform was in decline, he was still unavoidably attacked by officials, and he was accused of being an arbitrary power minister. Even after the disaster happened, the nobles were confiscated and the house was ransacked.

In the Ming Dynasty, cronies fought fiercely, and the contradiction between the fact and the cabinet system did not match the name and reality, so the cabinet minister had to become a person who was good at dancing with long sleeves and wandered among the parties.

Such a system is difficult to select capable people. People like Sun Chuanting and Jin Xuan, if it is not for Zhu Youjian's strong support, it is estimated that it will be difficult for them to sit in the cabinet for the rest of their lives. Therefore, Zhu Ciran's reform of the cabinet is Powers are clearly defined.

Since the first day of September, the cabinet and the six ministries have been separated, and the cabinet scholars have been permanently designated as seven people, namely Hong Chengchou, a scholar of Zhongjidian, Jin Xuan, a scholar of Wenyuan Pavilion, Sun Chuanting, a scholar of Wuyingdian, and a scholar of Jianjidian. Li Changgeng, Dongge University scholar Zhou Yanru, Wenlou University scholar Wen Tiren, and Wulou University scholar Yang Wenyue.

The six ministers were reappointed as Fan Jingwen, Minister of Officials, Xu Xiake, Minister of Rites, Lu Xiangsheng, Minister of War, Shen Tingyang, Minister of Household, Chen Qiyu, Minister of Criminal Justice, and Sun Yuanhua, Minister of Industry.

That is to say, the six ministries and the cabinet were separated, and the traditional court recommendation system was also changed.

Although the seven cabinet ministers are still selected by the court officials, the decision rests with the emperor, and the officials can only select the cabinet ministers, and the chief assistant is appointed by the emperor.

In addition, the cabinet is divided into five-year assessments, with the capable going up and the weak going down.

In terms of rank, the cabinet controls the six ministries and at the same time takes charge of national government affairs.

The cabinet has the right to appoint less than six ministers, and most officials other than the Metropolitan Procuratorate, to be responsible for formulating and implementing all major domestic and foreign policies and policies of the country.

At the same time, the cabinet is responsible to the emperor, reports to the emperor on a regular basis, and accepts the supervision of the Six Ministries, the Metropolitan Procuratorate and the emperor.

If the Metropolitan Procuratorate reports on the cabinet and the emperor approves it, the cabinet will be suspended and must be inspected by the three divisions.

Generally speaking, under Zhu Ciran's new system, the cabinet still does the same things, but they no longer concurrently serve as the six ministers. .

The triangular relationship is very stable politically, and the reason why Zhu Ciran made such an arrangement was because he wanted the power of eunuchs to withdraw from the stage and restore the political structure of the early Ming Dynasty.

It is also a triangular relationship. The relationship between the emperor, the six ministries, and the cabinet is much better than that of the emperor, civil servants, and eunuchs.

It can be seen that Zhu Ciran dislikes eunuchs interfering in politics very much. After all, he has traveled among the people and heard of the chaos caused by eunuchs interfering in politics during the Wanli period.

However, such a change made the situation of the cabinet even more embarrassing.

Under the new system, although the cabinet can exercise the power of the emperor.

But if the emperors are all workaholics like Zhu Yuanzhang, Zhu Di, Zhu Youjian, and Zhu Ciran, then the cabinet is basically useless.

As long as the emperor is more diligent, the power of the cabinet will be reduced, and the more diligent the emperor, the smaller the power of the cabinet.

Although this strengthened the legitimacy of the cabinet, it also greatly restricted the cabinet developed in the middle and late Ming Dynasty.

The cabinet can be tough on the six ministries, but not the emperor. This is the cabinet that Zhu Ciran wanted, and he also completed the new cabinet system he wanted with the help of Zhu Youjian's remaining prestige.

Under the new system, the cabinet is mainly to help the emperor deal with the memorials, which can reduce Zhu Ciran's workload, unlike before, the cabinet ministers had to be busy with six ministries.

However, the disadvantages of this are also obvious, that is, once the emperor is lazy, the chief assistant of the cabinet can always control the government, so it also has a certain binding force on the emperor.

For the cabinet, this is good news, and for Hong Chengchou, his happiest news is that under the new cabinet system, he finally took the coveted position of chief assistant of the cabinet.

Without excitement or panic, Hong Chengchou quickly adapted to his power.

Today was the first meeting of the new cabinet. He glanced at the six cabinet ministers, focusing on Sun Chuanting and Jin Xuan.

He knew very well that Jin Xuan represented the East Palace and Sun Chuanting represented the northern generals.

Jin Xuan mainly monitors the cabinet, while Sun Chuanting mainly checks and balances himself.

However, as far as they wanted to deal with him, Hong Chengchou wanted to laugh a little.

He is not afraid of direct ministers like Jin Xuan and Sun Chuanting. Compared with them, Hong Chengchou is more worried about people like Zhou Yanru and Wen Tiren who hide in the dark and hide evil intentions.

However, the Jiangnan forces behind them have been temporarily disintegrated by King Qi, so there is no need to be afraid of them.

Now in the entire Ming Dynasty, the only thing I need to worry about is His Royal Highness King Qi who is about to enter the feudal domain in fifty days or so...

Thinking of this, Hong Chengchou suddenly felt relaxed, and his attitude towards the six cabinet ministers became more calm.

"Since the beginning of autumn, the drought in various places has subsided slightly. It seems that we only need to pay for this year, and we can start collecting land taxes normally next year."

"What needs to be noted is whether the officials below will send additional miscellaneous items..."

Hong Chengchou narrowed his eyes, but still focused on Sun Chuanting and Jin Xuan.

For people like them who worry about the country and the people, what he needs to do is to do what they like, let them deal with what they dislike, and finally immerse themselves in it, unable to be distracted to deal with themselves.

"It should be like this!"

"Seconded!"

Sure enough, Sun Chuanting and Jin Xuan spoke one after the other, exactly in Hong Chengchou's arms.

"Then the two of you will accompany Li Gechen to supervise the Metropolitan Procuratorate, the Ministry of Officials, and the Yamen of the Ministry of Households."

"As for Wen Gechen and Zhou Gechen, they will continue to be in charge of the Ministry of Punishment and the Ministry of Industry."

"Yang Gechen still has to focus on the world's major affairs, and work with me to resolve conflicts in various places."

Hong Chengchou's arrangement seemed appropriate, let Zhou Yanru and Wen Tiren continue to stay in their comfort zone, not to come out to disturb him, and let Yang Wenyue, who was not as capable as him, be his deputy to handle government affairs.

With his arrangement, every point hits everyone's weakness, allowing power to be firmly in his own hands.

Of course, his actions can also be seen by everyone, but everyone feels that he can't make too much trouble.

Although Zhu Ciran is not as good as Zhu Youjian, he is not a mediocre master after all, not to mention that Zhu Youxiao sits behind him, and Hong Chengchou can only exercise part of his power.

Once he exceeds his duty, he will be restricted immediately.

Thinking this way, the first court meeting of the cabinet passed without objection.

But for the affairs of the world, everyone has to put forward their own views.

Jin Xuan frowned and said: "Technology is the primary productive force of the country. The investment in the Military Armament Institute needs to be increased next year. In addition, tractors also need to be quickly put into Hezhong and Nanzhou, and they need to be strictly guarded to prevent foreigners from seeing this. thing."

"If the supply problem of the garrison in the river can be solved, then the expenditure of the country and court can be appropriately reduced."

After Jin Xuan finished speaking, Hong Chengchou took the lead in expressing his opinion, and patted his palm on the table to pass.

Seeing this, Sun Chuanting also said:

"The quality and quality of the local soldiers, horses and yamen servants are uneven. While rectification is urgently needed, it is recommended to select from the students who graduated this year."

"In addition, not only them, officials also need to increase the intensity of Beijing inspection and assessment."

"Some officials are old-fashioned, and they should go home to take care of themselves for the rest of their lives."

Although Sun Chuanting did not like the Yanshan School, he also saw many advantages from the Yanshan School.

Compared with the low-level officials of the Ming Dynasty in the past, the low-level officials of the Yanshan faction still have a bottom line. This also shows that the Yanshan faction pays more attention to human rights. Although it is not obvious, it has at least made progress.

In Sun Chuanting's view, each generation of students will improve more than the previous generation, no matter whether they have just stepped into the officialdom or it is too late to commit evil deeds, they still have advantages.

Since it is an advantage, it should be enlarged.

Although they are not as skilled as former officials, at least they can learn.

The Ming Dynasty must continue to inject fresh blood in order to ensure that the Ming Dynasty's official administration continues to be clear.

In this regard, Hong Chengchou also approved the case.

"The affairs of the Governor's Mansion of the Five Armies need to be brought to the attention of His Highness and Long Live."

As a veteran minister, Li Changgeng said: "Throughout the ages, if a court has a strong army and horses and horses and does not fight in all directions, it will inevitably bring disaster to Xiao Qiang."

"There is no war at home and abroad at the moment, why not abolish the army as appropriate?"

"No..." Hong Chengchou rejected Li Changgeng's idea.

As a civil servant supported by the Western Army, it is impossible for Hong Chengchou to shoot himself in the foot, not to mention that Ming's army is already invincible.

"So in the Tang Dynasty, the population of the world was more than 7000 million, and the territory was not as good as that of our Ming Dynasty, and we still needed to maintain 57 troops."

"Now the territory of my Ming Dynasty is several times that of the Tang Dynasty, and the number of soldiers and horses is only 69."

"As long as the country returns to normal taxation, the annual tax payment will be as high as more than 2000 million taels, while the army support is only [-] million taels."

"In my opinion, not only can the army not be reduced, but it should be increased as appropriate after the drought."

"For example, at present, the frontiers that the Western Army and the Northern Army need to guard against are tens of thousands of miles long, and the total number of the two armies is only 22 horses."

"If the land tax is fully restored next year, then the Northern Army and the Western Army should add ten battalions each, for a total of more than [-] troops."

The role of Hong Chengchou and Sun Chuanting is mainly to enter the cabinet to maintain the status of warriors.

For veteran ministers like Li Changgeng who survived the Wanli period, although he has outstanding abilities, his perspective on things stays in the past.

The current Ming army is not as good as before, and it is not something that civil servants can cut if they say so.

Even the king of Qi, Zhu Youjian, can only reduce his troops in disguise by abolishing older soldiers.

What's more, the world structure has also changed now, and cutting down the army will be a bit of martial arts at its own expense.

Once the Ming army used rifles to fight Europeans' matchlock guns, then 69 troops were more than enough to crush the world.

But the problem is that in the long-term confrontation and communication, the current European army has started to equip the whole army with flintlock guns half a century earlier, and the spread of line tactics has become more and more widespread, so the situation facing Ming Dynasty is different.

Conscription of 75 troops, allowing the Ming army to maintain [-] field troops, was the idea that Hong Chengchou, Sun Chuanting, and Yang Wenyue all reached a consensus on, so Li Changgeng's first proposal in the new cabinet was rejected in this way.

Not only was it rejected, Hong Chengchou also proposed to recruit [-] troops to face the complicated situation in the West.

It was in Hong Chengchou's interest that the Western Army increased its strength, while the Northern Army increased its strength because Hong Chengchou gave Sun Chuanting the capital to check and balance himself, so that the emperor would not feel that he could not deal with it.

Hong Chengchou's calculations were resounding, and Li Changgeng could only sigh helplessly when he saw this.

"Since there is nothing wrong, let's go to the prison country."

Hong Chengchou glanced at the crowd, then got up and left the table.

Seeing this, Sun Chuanting and others also left one after another, and each went to busy with their own affairs.

Not long after, the content of the first court meeting of the cabinet was sent to the desk of Zhu Ciran in the Palace of Spring Harmony.

Zhu Ciran opened it to watch the contents, and then raised his brows and said after a short while:

"The old minister is too old and has too many rules, what do you think?"

The object of Zhu Ciran's question was the three people sitting opposite him, waiting to answer the question.

When the dark clouds left, the sun shone into the hall again, and the faces of Du Yinxi, Sun Kewang, and Li Dingguo were also clearly illuminated.

Facing Zhu Ciran's words, Du Yinxi stated:

"Although the thoughts of the old minister can't keep up with the changes in the court, it is a process that the court needs to face in transition. Your Highness doesn't need to care about it, it will quietly exit."

"Without the old man in charge, the newcomer will be arrogant and impetuous." Sun Kewang concealed something in his words, but Zhu Ciran could hear what he wanted to say.

He turned his attention to Li Dingguo, and compared to the previous two, Li Dingguo nodded without concealment:

"Veterans may not be swept away, but the old rules and bad habits must be swept away, lest those who come from behind will also be infected with the faults."

"Okay!" Zhu Ciran seemed a little happy when he finally heard what he wanted to hear, not to mention that it was said by his "favored" Li Dingguo, so Zhu Ciran also turned to Sun Kewang and said:

"I think the atmosphere in the Qi Kingdom is very good. You can go to Mr. Jin to learn from it. Some of the outdated customs of the country must be abolished, especially the one that makes people kneel!"

Zhu Ciran's attitude is open-minded, and he doesn't really like to see others kneel down to him, but this rule has never been changed, so this time he wants to cancel all kinds of unreasonable rules in one fell swoop, and sweep them into the garbage dump.

He had a hunch that if he didn't do all these things early while his uncle Qi Wang was still there, it would be extremely difficult for him to do these things afterwards.

Thinking of this, Zhu Ciran frowned:

"Time waits for no one, I must hurry up..."

　On location, this chapter was written on the car, and the update is a bit late.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)