Established a thousand-year family from the end of Qin Dynasty

Chapter 130 Salt and Iron Conference ([-])

another three months later

the sixth year of the first yuan
After six years of recuperation, only about 500 million of the more than 300 million refugees in the Kanto counties remained, and nearly 200 million refugees were either immigrated to the border areas to farm.

Either some tyrants had to sell the fertile land to the imperial court at a low price after being bankrupted by the counting order, and then the imperial court allocated these fertile land to the refugees for farming.

Either the local tyrants were moved to Guanzhong, and then the fertile land left in the local area was forced to be sold to the imperial court at a low price, and then distributed to the landless refugees by the imperial court.

Or they ran to some tycoons who lacked tenant farmers to become tenant farmers.

Jin Ridun, one of the four auxiliary ministers, had already died of illness. Under Huo Guang's governance, Hexi, Heshuo, and Liaodong became the main refugee farming areas.

60 refugees were relocated to Hexi, 50 to Heshuo, and [-] to Liaodong, allowing them to farm and become self-cultivated farmers of the imperial court.

Originally, the population of Liaodong was 17 in the counting book. Later, the late emperor Liu Che moved 24 to Liaodong, so there were 19. However, due to war, famine, land annexation and other reasons, only 10 people remained in the counting book. , Now the imperial court has moved another 29 people to Liaodong, making Liaodong actually have a population of [-] on the books.

At the same time, the imperial court implemented the policy of recuperation and merged counties and counties with a small population in the world to reduce the scale of officials and save salary expenses. For example, Xuantu County was moved to the northeast of Liaodong County, Zhenfan County and Lintun County Merged into Lelang County.

At the same time, the number of soldiers in counties and counties was also reduced, especially those in inland counties.

In the large counties of the Central Plains such as Yingchuan, the county soldiers have been reduced from four to five thousand to two thousand, and the county soldiers in frontier counties like Liaodong have also been reduced from seven thousand to five thousand.

In such a situation, Huo Guang presided over the Salt and Iron Conference, allowing the virtuous writers and the imperial court center represented by the royal historian Sang Hongyang and the prime minister Tian Qianqiu to discuss the future development direction of the Great Han around the Yantie official business, and comment on The strategy of salt and iron in the period of the first emperor.

There are eight virtuous people, all of whom come from county officials in the Guanzhong area.

There are 60 people in Wenxue, all of whom are Confucian scholars from the counties in the Kanto region.

"Is everything here?" Huo Guang asked Du Yannian about the specific matters of presiding over the meeting.

"It's all here." Du Yannian replied.

Afterwards, all the participants knelt and sat on their own soft seats, and many court officials and celebrities from all over the world knelt and watched around.

clang--

The giant bronze bell was rang, and Du Yannian shouted to the people who were chirping, "Salt and iron meeting, start!"

The people who were whispering stopped talking, but sat upright.

Taichang Wang Changjiong, one of the nine ministers, also came, but he didn't represent any party, he just came to join in the fun, so he sat on the periphery.

But another member of the Wang family came here as one of the representatives of literature.

This person is Wang Hongyin, the second son of Wang Changzhi, and Zhang Mu, the second son of the Patriarch of the Zhang family, who is also a representative of literature, came with him.

After the scene was quiet for a while, one of the virtuous people stood up and spoke: "Human nature is inherently good, and the people of the world are simple and kind. , so that the atmosphere of the world is corrupted, and if the Yantie official camp is not abolished, it will be difficult for the people of the world to be educated."

"Yeah yeah!"

"That's a reasonable statement. Since the court's Yantie official camp, the people in our county have become snobbish. They are not as simple and honest as before. Their hearts are not old."

Literary representative Wang Hongyin also added: "Mountains, rivers, lakes, and forests belonged to the common people in ancient times, and the sages and sage kings in ancient times did not monopolize these places, nor did they monopolize the salt and iron produced in these places, so the ancient The people in China are living a good life, but now, the state has monopolized the wealth that originally belonged to the people, causing damage to the interests of the people. Isn’t this a struggle with the people?”

Although the Wang family can collude with salt and iron officials to secretly sell private salt and iron, the Wang family still misses the good old days when they could sell salt and iron openly, so they send their children who have read Confucian classics to attend the meeting.

Regarding what happened in ancient times, Wang Hongyin naturally understood that those sage kings and sages didn't want to monopolize, but they didn't have the strength. After all, in ancient times, everyone came from different tribal alliances. Where is the Lord?

On the premise that this kind of power is not concentrated, even if you want to monopolize, you can't monopolize. The premise of monopoly is the concentration of power.

But again, knowing is one thing, how to say it and how to do it is another.

Although he knew that the sage kings and sages in ancient times were no different from the people of today, they just had the filter of the times, but Wang Hongyin, as a literary representative who has read Confucian classics, naturally wanted to open his mouth to sages and shut up sages, and cite ancient examples to refute Sang. Hongyang and others, let them let go of the salt and iron official camp, so that the Wang family can sell salt and iron again openly.

"It is precisely because the country competes with the people for profit and takes away the wealth that originally belonged to the people, so the people who have lost these wealth will become selfish in order to regain their wealth, racking their brains every day to think about how to increase their own wealth. Wealth will eventually lead to the corruption of the world." Zhang Mu hit the railway while it was hot.

"That makes sense."

"Yeah yeah."

"The people in ancient times were very happy, because the holy kings in ancient times did not have an official camp of salt and iron."

"So only by canceling the Yantie official camp, the world will be better and the people will be happy."

Other virtuous literatures also conformed one after another, and some respected people looked at the young Wang Hongyin and Zhang Mu very much.

"Where did those two teenagers come from?" someone asked.

"It seems to be Liaodong."

"How can such a talented person come out of a remote place like Liaodong?"

In the face of the virtuous writers, Sang Hongyang, the imperial historian, launched a counterattack: "The Xiongnu repeatedly invaded the border. It will cost a lot of money to guard against them. If you don't guard against them, you will be slaughtered. In order to protect your people, the late emperor, So take precautions against the Xiongnu, but it takes a lot of money to defend against the Xiongnu, so the first emperor will carry out the salt and iron official camp, and use the salt and iron official camp and the money earned from the liquor monopoly to attack the Huns, so as to protect the people of my big man. "

"Therefore, the Yantie official camp is a policy to protect the people and is beneficial to the people. How can it be said that it is competing with the people for profit?"

"Besides, the soldiers need to purchase weapons and equipment and warm clothes for them when they are going to fight outside. All of these need to consume a lot of wealth. If the Yantie official camp is cancelled, will our soldiers starve to death and freeze to death at the front line?"

Sang Hongyang's rebuttal with reason and evidence made all the virtuous writers frown slightly, thinking about how to refute it.

Just when the virtuous writers didn't know how to refute, and Sang Hongyang thought he had won the debate, Wang Hongyin, who had been thinking for a long time, spoke, and he said.

(End of this chapter)