Saving the Ming Dynasty: I can exchange bodies with Chongzhen

Chapter 39 Special Rights

"Come here, let me ask you, where is Gao Qiquan now?" Zhu Changgan suddenly thought of such a person.

This bastard was originally the deputy of the military supervisor eunuch Lu Zhi. He followed the army to the Jiaodong expedition, and I don't know how he earned the reputation of being "knowledgeable about military affairs and good at fighting."

It was precisely this title that Chongzhen believed in without a doubt.

But it was also because of him that Lu Xiangsheng was killed.

When Li Zicheng entered the capital, he fled. Not long after the establishment of the Southern Ming regime, he was recruited to serve as the commander-in-chief of the Beijing camp, but when the Qing army marched south, he immediately threw himself into the arms of the Qing.

Since he could not transfer Lu Xiangsheng to Kyoto for the time being, he could temporarily transfer the eunuch Gao Qiquan, this scourge, back to Kyoto.

A eunuch knelt on the ground and replied, "Your Majesty, Eunuch Gao is now in Liaodong."

"Convey my order and call him back."

At this time, Wang Chengen came back and said, "Your Majesty, Eunuch Gao is in charge of the army in Liaojin. If you ask him to come back, is there anyone to replace him?"

"If there is no one to replace you, we can just send a eunuch to monitor you."

"This..." Wang Chengen's face suddenly changed and he didn't know how to answer.

"Hmm? You want to go against my will?"

"I dare not!" Wang Chengen saw that the emperor looked unhappy, and he knelt down and said, "I will ask the cabinet to draft an edict."

After coming out of the palace, Wang Chengen looked extremely ugly. He did not go to the cabinet, but went to Cao Huachun.

He was also a eunuch. The emperor wanted to transfer Gao Qiquan back, but he did not let an important official among the eunuchs fill the vacancy. This revealed a huge signal.

The emperor wanted to weaken the eunuchs' power to command the military and govern the government.

……

In Prince Xiang's mansion, Chongzhen's face changed drastically when he heard Zhu Changgan's words. He was afraid that he would do something inappropriate in front of Mr. Dugu, so he made an excuse to go to the toilet.

"The inner minister's method cannot be withdrawn! Gao Qiqian cannot be turned back!" Chongzhen said with a pale face: "This is destroying the Great Wall by oneself."

In the early years of Chongzhen, he cleared out the eunuch party, but soon discovered that the civil servants were equally unreliable, so in August of the seventh year of Chongzhen, he issued a special edict.

First, he severely criticized the court officials.

"The imperial court held an imperial examination to recruit officials, and placed high hopes on them, offering them generous treatment... I didn't expect that the officials would engage in corruption, shirk their responsibilities, not care about the people, and ignore their livelihood..."

The overall meaning is that the emperor has high hopes for the civil and military officials in the court, but you are corrupt and do not do practical work. In this case, I can only restore the "ancestral system."

The so-called ancestral system is that the current eunuchs are sent to the border to serve as military supervisors, and Gao Qiquan was promoted at that time.

In the first year that Gao Qiquan served as military inspector, he defeated Kong Youde and won a great victory. Therefore, in the eyes of Chongzhen, Gao Qiquan was a military strategist of the Ming Dynasty.

How could they just transfer him back like that? And not only that, they just randomly found a eunuch to fill the vacancy?

I have worked so hard to get the eunuchs to lead the army and govern the country. With just this sentence, aren't you throwing away all my years of hard work?

Just when Chongzhen was about to curse angrily, a footstep came in, "My son, what took you so long? Mr. Dugu has been waiting for you for a long time."

Prince Xiang Zhu Yiming came in person to supervise.

"I... I may have a stomachache. I'll go back right away." Chongzhen quickly got up and walked towards the study with a grim look on his face.

……

Zhu Changgan naturally had his own plans for recalling Gao Qiquan.

Gao Qiquan's so-called "reputation for military knowledge" was just a coincidence, otherwise he would not have suffered repeated defeats after winning only one battle.

Although eunuchs are one of the emperor's own people, they have lived in the palace since childhood and have never been exposed to military affairs. Most of them are greedy and stupid. They can be used as knives to kill people, but they are ineffective in waging war against foreign enemies.

In the sixth year of Chongzhen, Zhang Yingchang led his army to Shaanxi to suppress bandits. As a result, the eunuch Yan Siyin, the supervisor of the army, took the opportunity to demand bribes. The magistrate of Fenyang was unable to satisfy him and was forced to commit suicide by jumping into a well. There are countless such examples, which also indirectly show that eunuchs commanding troops and governing the government can not only fail to change the situation, but on the contrary.

What they did in the army would greatly weaken the combat effectiveness of the Ming army and accelerate the demise of the Ming Dynasty.

"Your Majesty, Jinyiwei Commander Li Ruolian is here to see you."

"Let him in."

Zhu Changgan looked at Li Ruolian, who was covered in blood and had a sad face, and said, "Commander Li, you have worked hard. Have you encountered any difficulties?"

"Your Majesty, we haven't encountered any difficulties, but...how should Wenyuan Pavilion Grand Secretary Zhang Sizhi deal with it?" Li Ruolian said with a thin layer of sweat on his forehead.

Zhang Sizhi was imprisoned, but he was an important minister of the cabinet after all. The environment in the prison was very bad. If he died in prison and angered the civil officials, they would impeach him and even a hundred heads would not be enough to chop off.

He had been a Jinyiwei for so long that he naturally knew what the emperor was thinking.

He will never do anything that is detrimental to his reputation. He will always push the people who do things to take the blame and keep a good reputation for himself.

Zhu Changgan looked at him steadily, and naturally understood his thoughts. "Hearing what you said, I think Zhang Sizhi's crime is not punishable by death, but the crime of disrespect is still inevitable. Go and call the head of the Ministry of Justice."

……

The Minister of Punishments was named Zheng Sanjun, and he served as an important official for four generations during the Wanli, Tianqi, Taichang and Chongzhen periods.

Hearing that they were discussing Zhang Sizhi's problem, Zheng Sanjun hurriedly shouted: "Your Majesty, you have been worried and tired for a long time, and people's feelings are not expressed... I wish to protect your body to protect the world, and win the hearts of the people to regain the territory."

Zhu Changgan did not chat with him, but asked Zhang Sizhi directly and concisely what crime he should be charged with.

At first, Zheng Sanjun wanted to argue, but Zhu Changgan refused to give in and was not satisfied, so I continued to keep Zhang Sizhi in the imperial prison.

When it came to forty strokes of the cane, Zhu Changgan finally spoke up, "Let's do it. I want to personally go to the Meridian Gate to watch the execution."

“……”The muscles on Zheng Sanjun’s face twitched.

In the Ming Dynasty, the imperial caning was approved by the Imperial Household Department, reviewed by the Ministry of Justice, and finally handed over to the Embroidered Uniform Guard for execution. Now both the Eastern Depot and the Embroidered Uniform Guard are in the hands of the emperor.

Plus, with the emperor in person, cheating was almost impossible.

If it were anyone else, this process would take at least one or two days, but with the East Factory and the Embroidered Uniform Guard in hand, Zhang Sizhi was dragged out of the imperial prison in less than an hour.

The censors of the Ming Dynasty took pride in "making honest remonstrances" and regarded scolding the emperor as their highest goal. Many of them used this to gain political capital and were complacent about being beaten by the emperor in court.

In the past, whenever someone was beaten with a stick in the court, the civil officials below would gather in a crowd, with gleams in their eyes and constant noise, wishing that they were the ones being beaten.

A "self-sacrificing and honest advice" may earn you a place in history.

This alone is enough to drive them crazy.

But this time, the scene was extremely silent, with everyone's expressions varying.

Some were weeping, some were sympathetic, some were sighing, and some were looking excited...

Because Zhang Sizhi was not beaten for giving advice, but for "being disrespectful."

Moreover, according to tradition, a minister who has been severely reprimanded cannot stay in his position again. This means that after this incident, it is inevitable that Zhang Sizhi will withdraw from the cabinet, and there will be a vacancy in the cabinet.

"Why are you so excited? Is this position reserved for you?" Zhu Changgan looked at everyone and said lightly.

The reason why he wanted to strictly reprimand Zhang Sizhi and kick him out of the cabinet was because someone had just reported that Sun Chengzong had entered Beijing.

"Chongzhen is not completely useless. At least this 'special simplicity' is very consistent with my personality."

The so-called "special appointment" is the emperor's privilege to select and appoint his own cabinet. Chongzhen could use it, so Zhu Changgan had no pressure to use it.

　The structure of the court is about to complete its initial small goal (no need to worry about the emperor's dissolution every day). There will be more scenes of killing the Jiannu and expanding the territory. If you have any opinions, please feel free to raise them.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)