The Prosperous Era of Longwan

In the early years of Hongzhi, due to insufficient annual income, Emperor Hongzhi issued an edict soon after he ascended the throne, announcing that all clan members' salaries and grains would be "halved."

In the 14th year of Hongzhi, the imperial court promulgated further reform measures, "The prince's lumi is worth half of the lumi and the rice banknotes, and the princess's lumi is 4 cents of the original color and 6 cents of the folded banknotes." It also stipulated that everyone The silver part of the original Lumi is "20 taels less for every one hundred taels".

When the banknote law was in bad condition and treasure banknotes were severely devalued, the imperial court adopted the method of "breaking banknotes", which reduced the actual amount of Lumi paid out by the clan during the Hongzhi period by about half compared to the Hongwu period.

However, in fact, these reforms to reduce lumi have not fundamentally solved the problem of clan lumi. The reason is due to two points:

First, because the amount of Lumi paid was too large and overwhelmed, local governments were unable to provide it, so they resorted to arrears, either not paying it at all, or paying it according to a certain proportion.

The second point is that due to insufficient distribution of Lumi, the lower-level clans are unable to receive the Lumi they depend on for survival, and are increasingly impoverished.

The reason for this factor is that the Lumi distribution system is not received by the clan itself from the local government offices, but by the princes, who are then issued to the county kings, and then to the generals who govern the country, the generals who assist the country and the generals who support the country. General Fengguo, and finally Lieutenant Fengguo.

There is no problem if there is enough Lumi in the local area. Once the local allocation is insufficient, a small amount of Lumi will be directly divided by the princes and princes, and the lower clan will not get any Lumi at all.

Lin Run's memorial was to solve the problem of lower-level clans and proposed that princes and princes receive rice and three stones in the next month.

Three stones means that they can guarantee that they will not die of hunger or poverty.

Of course Wei Guangde knew the reason for Lin Run's suggestion. Wang Zongmu, Shanxi's right-hand governor, had reported that due to famine and arrears of rice, "several or two hundred people died of famine last year" in Shanxi's vassal vassals.

Regarding the issue of the Lumi clan, Wei Guangde felt from the beginning that the endless reproduction of the clan was the root cause of the collapse of the Lumi system. Every emperor who ascended the throne would increase the number of princes, and the princes would increase the number of county princes. The burden on the court continued to increase, and in the end everyone nothing left.

Once this memorial is submitted, Wei Guangde believes that it will definitely be approved. As long as he guarantees that the clan will not be starved to death, Emperor Jiajing will definitely not refuse, but the local government will further owe the clan lumi.

Of course, Lin Run was not stupid enough to offend the upper-level clan by himself. He also proposed that "it is appropriate for the ministers to gather together to discuss the matter at the court and jointly formulate strategies for dealing with the aftermath, and then gather the people to judge from their own hearts to establish a rule that will never be changed." statement.

For the current clan, the lower-level clan members will certainly like Lin Run's memorial, because it solves some of the problems they face, but for the clan from top to bottom, they are also dissatisfied, because the full text of the memorial has been revealed Come up with an idea - or reduce the salary.

For upper-class clans such as princes and county princes, in fact, they do not rely on Lumi. In the early Ming Dynasty, no matter how much Lumi they had, they constantly reported to the emperor and asked for Lumi rewards, which is the so-called "clan begging". , just like the nobles begging for salt, the reason is lack of money.

However, their real income is that they hold a large amount of tax-free land in their hands, and they continue to annex land, usurp local commercial taxes, and even use their status to monopolize commerce and gain huge profits.

It is impossible to directly abolish Zonglu. This will bankrupt countless lower-level clans and ultimately harm the royal family. However, it is feasible to ask the upper-level clans to fund it, but it will actually destroy the property ownership system established by the Ming Dynasty.

Even if he is an emperor and is said to be rich all over the world, he cannot deprive others of their property at will.

Holding Lin Run's memorial in his hand, he looked up at him and asked, "When do you plan to hand it in?"

"I just want you to correct me. I've already discussed it with others."

After saying this, Lin Run pointed around and said, "Some of them are interested, but more of them are still unwilling to touch the clan for fear of getting angry."

Wei Guangde naturally understood the meaning of Lin Run's words.

As long as there is a vassal king in their hometown, even if these officials know the inside story, they are unwilling to touch the vassal system for fear of offending the clan and causing disadvantage to their clan locally, because in order to solve the vassal Lumi, essentially Only by reducing and continuously reducing their demand for Lumi can the financial pressure be fundamentally solved.

In fact, Wei Guangde also had some ideas over the years, but this idea would be extremely detrimental to the upper-level clan. He was worried about getting burned, so he could only continue to think about other methods.

Now that he met Lin Run, what Wei Guangde was considering at this time was whether to use him as the knife to slash Zongfan fiercely.

"Your memorial will help the lower-level clan get a little money in the short term, which will help them satisfy their hunger, but it still won't fundamentally solve the problem. They will also make trouble after a long time."

Wei Guangde just commented lightly.

"But now the imperial court's finances are no longer able to support the supply of vassal rice. Shanxi and other provinces with many vassal kings have chosen to resolve their disputes through arrears and send conflicts to the imperial court.

In fact, the Lumi problem of the clan has reached a point where we have to face it and find a solution. Is it possible that in the 16th year of Jiajing, the Henan clan will once again stage a rebellion with no results? "

Lin Run just said.

Wei Guangde fell into deep thought. Before coming to the Ming Dynasty, Wei Guangde had the same view as most people on the Internet. He believed that the finances of the Ming Dynasty were dragged down by the almost crazy reproduction of the vassals. In fact, this was not the case at all, or it was not accurate.

The vassals of the Ming Dynasty were indeed very prolific. In the Jiajing Dynasty alone, taking the Zhou family in Henan as an example, there were more than a thousand people in the early years of Jiajing, but in the first two years, the population had expanded five times to nearly 6,000. , it only took more than thirty years.

Wei Guangde did not pay attention to this data, but only heard people mention it in casual chat.

The sudden increase in the clan's population will indeed increase the demand for Lumi infinitely and create a huge financial burden for the court. However, in fact, the Ming Dynasty's finances had problems very early on. The solutions at that time were "Zhe Chao" and "Zhe Se". The problem is solved in a similar way to official salaries.

Part of the Lumi was folded into waste paper-like treasure notes, and part of the actual issued Lumi was folded into silver. The price of each stone was far lower than the market price. Therefore, in fact, the Lumi distributed by the Ming court to the vassals was only about the amount of Lumi that should be given to the vassals. 30% of rice.

However, even this figure of 30% is still a large amount of expenditure, especially for the already stretched Mingting finance.

However, based on Wei Guangde's understanding of the officialdom of the Ming Dynasty, he felt that this was not all due to the local government's inability to pay the arrears.

Beginning in the middle period of Jiajing, the Zonglu of the middle and lower-level clans were often deducted and delayed by local officials. Considering that the civil servants of the Ming Dynasty even dared to embezzle and delay military pay, let alone ordinary clans with no power?

That is to say, for relatively high-status clans such as princes and county princes, local officials dare not deduct money at will, but delays do occur from time to time.

As for what Lin Run said about the Henan clan's "repeated protests", it was actually caused by Henan Zonglu's arrears of more than 2.4 million dan. This figure is actually the actual total amount. After discounting, more than 1 million dan should actually be paid. stone.

As for why there is such a huge figure, of course it is not the Lumi that should be paid out in a year, but the result of many years of accumulated arrears.

"I think I can hand it over first, that's it."

Wei Guangde looked at Lin Run, thought about it and added: "As you said, it must be solved, otherwise something will happen sooner or later."

Wei Guangde thought about it and did not let Lin Run modify the memorial. After all, this is what people in this era can think of, and he did not intend to submit his own plan immediately. He also wanted to see what other courtiers said about the clan. What opinions would Fan Lumi have?

Test the waters with Lin Run's proposal to see if Emperor Jiajing plans to amend the vassal regulations in the next few years to pave the way for his son to ascend the throne.

But after talking about this, Wei Guangde asked curiously: "Ruoyu, how did you think of this?"

In Wei Guangde's impression, he didn't seem to have heard of any trouble in the royal family under the palace this year, which was strange.

"Last year I read the memorial of Lord Zongmu Wang of Shanxi Province, and I became interested in it."

Lin Run replied.

"As expected."

Wei Guangde thought in his mind that he had probably been inquiring about Zong Lu from many sources for more than a year, so he had delayed it until now.

After leaving the Metropolitan Procuratorate and sitting on the carriage, Wei Guangde sighed in his heart. In fact, could the Ming Dynasty sect Lumi really not be able to afford it?

In fact, this is not necessarily the case. At least as far as the clan of the Jiajing Dynasty is concerned, there is no problem at all if they want to pay taxes, but the premise is that the taxes and services must be collected.

Why can't the taxes be collected?

There are too many tax-free fields, and no one pays taxes. Those who should pay taxes find ways to donate them to nobles and famous scholars to avoid taxes and servitude.

In essence, the local government has no subjective initiative and is indifferent to increasing taxes and revenue.

Thinking of this, Wei Guangde couldn't help but secretly laugh at Zhu Yuanzhang, the great ancestor of the Ming Dynasty, who had come up with some policies to cut off his descendants and dig holes for his descendants.

In fact, looking at ancient and modern times, there are really not many emperors like Zhu Yuanzhang.

It is strange that state taxes have not increased at all since the founding of the Ming Dynasty nearly two hundred years ago.

Speaking of this, we have to say that the tax system established by Zhu Yuanzhang in the early Ming Dynasty had already stipulated and fixed the amount of land tax that each prefecture and county in the world should pay.

Considering the common people so much, to be honest, Zhu Yuanzhang is definitely the most conscientious emperor.

After the land tax is fixed, the people will open up wasteland and cultivate the land on their own. Calculated in this way, the cultivated land will become more and more, the population will also increase, but the tax revenue will not increase, so the taxes and servitude evenly distributed to each common people will naturally decrease.

Of course, the disadvantage is that the local officials do not have the task of increasing taxes. They only need to complete the tax collection figures set by their elders every year. This is also the reason why a large number of hidden fields appeared in the middle and late Ming Dynasty. The government did not care about this at all. I was so concerned that I didn’t even bother to check the actual condition of the fields.

What's more, they colluded with local gentry families to pass on the equally divided land taxes to the people, and levied taxes and servitude on their original land and newly reclaimed land. If they wanted not to pay taxes, they naturally had to find reasons.

From this, the policy of preferential exemptions for scholars came into being. The emperor's original preferential and exemption regulations were intended to encourage folk writing, but they gradually amplified the effect.

At this moment, the carriage suddenly stopped, and someone from the front of the carriage shouted: "Master, Prince Yu's Mansion has arrived."

Wei Guangde got up, got off the carriage, and walked into Prince Yu's Mansion.

For the concierge and bodyguards of Prince Yu's Mansion, they are extremely familiar with Wei Guangde, so naturally they will not stop him from entering the mansion.

No matter what happens, I always come to Prince Yu's Mansion. The main reason is that you can learn a lot of news here.

The current Prince Yu's Mansion is like a small Jin Yiwei, constantly collecting news from various government offices in Beijing.

When Wei Guangde arrived, only Yin Shizhen and Zhang Juzheng were in the room. There was a stack of notes in front of each of them, which should be the message sent today.

"Hey, everyone is busy."

After entering the room, Wei Guangde smiled.

"Haha, actually there is nothing to be busy with."

Yin Shizhen smiled.

Wei Guangde sat down in his seat, turned sideways to them and asked, "Is there any good news from the DPRK today?"

Recently, the Ming court seems to have become smoother because of Yan Song's resignation, and there are no longer as many messy and annoying things as before, so Wei Guangde said this.

"Don't tell me, it's true."

Yin Shizhen answered the conversation, flipping through the papers in front of him, finding one of them and saying: "Today Xu Xu, the censor of the salt patrol, reported that during the ancestors' time, Huaiyan salt had Changgu, Cunji and Shuixiang, totaling 705,000 One thousand one hundred and eighty citations, each weighing 200 kilograms.

In the border areas, salt was imported for every eight cents of silver, and after Yongle, it was two buckets and five liters for every nanometer.

In recent years, it has been increasing. Counting the hair, besides the normal salt, there is surplus salt. In addition to the surplus salt, there are also processing costs, which include adding orders, adding quotations, and cutting them off.

Yan Maoqing saw that the salt was blocked and was not selling well, so he wanted to clear it up, but he didn't know that there was a switch but no salt was sold. The merchant was in dire straits, so he asked the Ministry of Household Affairs to waive the increase, and he still levied 600,000 taels every year. "

Hearing Yin Shizhen's words, Wei Guangde was stunned and couldn't help asking: "Is this good news?"

Wei Guangde's question stunned Yin Shizhenwen, and said: "Isn't it good news to get rid of the bad government established by the strict party?"

Zhang Juzheng understood the meaning of Wei Guangde's words, but he shook his head gently with a smile on his lips.

Zhang Juzheng, like Wei Guangde, is more practical and does not pay attention to who proposed the so-called "bad government", but only whether it is beneficial to the court.

If we simply say that the salt reform carried out by Yan Maoqing was wrong because he was a strict party, then it is definitely wrong.

In fact, as Yin Shizhen said, under Yan Maoqing's salt policy, the court could receive one million taels of salt tax every year. However, according to what Xu Xu said, the tax tax would be reduced by more than 400,000 taels immediately.

This is more than 400,000 taels of tax silver. How many 400,000 taels of silver were wasted by the Ming court?

As for the fact that the salt merchants could not sell the remaining salt in time, it meant that there was too much salt produced by the salt field and could not be sold, so it was lost to the salt merchants. Wei Guangde felt like hehe.

As the censor of the salt patrol, Xu Xu could not have known how much of the population could be satisfied by the official salt.

It had only been two months since Yan Maoqing had resigned from the post of Prime Minister Yan Zhengdu Censor. He had been transferred to Dali Temple before, but was soon dismissed and was living idle. Unexpectedly, in such a short period of time, the salt merchants got through and contacted Xu Xu. It is also quite powerful.

"What did Tobe say? Do you really want to go straight to the memorial?"

Wei Guangde thought of Yin Shizhen's previous attitude and asked.