jdhmnovel Chapter 567 Did I provoke Yang the Madman?
Chapter 567 Did I provoke Yang the Madman?
Thinking of the students from Ningyang County, Zhu Biao couldn't help but rub his forehead.
"If the upper beam is crooked, the lower beam will be crooked too; the ancients were right."
Zhu Biao pulled out several memorials from the table and had them handed to Li Shanchang and Liu Bowen.
"The Korean Duke of Gonghe Chengyi might as well take a look first."
"I just can't understand it. What kind of population does a county magistrate from Shanxi need?"
Li Shanchang took the memorial with a bewildered expression, glanced at it, and handed it directly to Liu Bowen.
Liu Bowen was equally bewildered.
The county magistrate in Shanxi is complaining about a shortage of manpower. Is there anything more absurd than this?
It's important to know that Shanxi has a population of over four million, which is much larger than the combined population of Henan and Shandong.
In the past two years, the imperial court has been relocating people from Shanxi to Shandong, Henan and other places in order to alleviate the land pressure in Shanxi.
Now, things have gotten really out of hand. A county magistrate from Shanxi is actually claiming that there isn't enough data on the people of Shanxi and is asking the imperial court to find a way to relocate people to his county.
Li Shanchang forced a smile and bowed to Zhu Biao, saying, "Your Highness, I feel... it seems we have been mistaken about something all along."
Zhu Biao was slightly taken aback, and asked, puzzled, "What does the Duke of Han mean?"
Li Shanchang stroked his beard and said, "We originally thought that there were few people in Shandong and Henan, especially since the Prince Consort's memorial said that the roads were all overgrown with weeds, deserted, with bones on the roads and wild beasts running rampant."
Zhu Biao nodded. "What my brother-in-law said in his memorial was somewhat exaggerated compared to what I saw and heard on my way to Shandong, but it was not far off."
Li Shanchang shook his head slightly and said, "That's where the mistake lies. The Prince Consort said that Shandong was sparsely populated, but at that time, Shandong had nearly two million people, while Shanxi had only four million people."
"It seems to be twice as many as in Shandong, and there are even sayings that people have nowhere to stand."
"However, the so-called lack of land for the people in Shanxi is either because there is not enough land to distribute to the people, or because there is land but it has not been distributed to the people?"
This is a typical example of discussing land allocation without considering mergers and acquisitions.
Because it is said that Shanxi has a large population and little land, from Emperor Zhu to Zhu Biao, then to Li Shanchang and Liu Bowen, and even the entire Ming Dynasty court, everyone subconsciously believed that Shanxi had too many people, which led to many people not having land.
Li Shanchang continued, "During the prosperous Tang Dynasty, Chang'an alone had a population of hundreds of thousands."
"A province as large as Shanxi can't even hold a few million people?"
"The claim that people in Shanxi have no place to stand is actually based on the premise of severe land annexation."
"With the implementation of the land distribution decree and the progressive tax system, coupled with the continuous outward migration of people starting in the third year of the Hongwu reign..."
Li Shanchang said with a dark face, "Therefore, the population of Shanxi may indeed not be enough."
"Especially those students from Ningyang County, they would always be busy with this workshop or that workshop, and they were all very enthusiastic about mining."
"Unless that county has no advantages whatsoever, has no way to set up workshops, has no mineral resources, and can't even raise cattle, pigs, or sheep."
"Otherwise, even if we allocate 10,000 people to each county, it wouldn't be enough."
As the saying goes, the upper beam is not straight and the lower beam is crooked.
The magistrate of Ningyang County liked to build roads, set up workshops, and mine, which made the people of Ningyang County live a relatively better life. Under the influence of what they saw and heard, these officials from Ningyang County naturally followed suit and frantically built roads, set up workshops, and mined in their own counties.
Therefore, the problem now is not whether Shanxi has a sufficient population.
Rather, it was because the officials from Ningyang County didn't have enough people under their command.
It was precisely because of this that several county magistrates from Ningyang County led their yamen runners to the prefectural government office to seize people, and after seizing them, they even wrote memorials to impeach each other.
It was for this very reason that Zhou Liangyu, the magistrate of Luan County, colluded with the Koreans and extensively employed Korean laborers working illegally.
“Give them to them.”
Zhu Biao thought about it briefly and then made up his mind: "Stop relocating people to other prefectures and counties, and start with these twenty-odd counties first."
"Or tell the other prefectures and counties directly that if they want the court to relocate people to their areas, they should obediently write a memorial."
"It's better than the current situation where you have to fight for what you want and get what you don't want."
At this point, Zhu Biao picked up another letter.
“This is a letter my father wrote back, and there is a memorial to the throne submitted by my brother-in-law in it.”
"It concerns the reform of local county governments."
"The reform of the imperial court was also mentioned in passing."
Li Shanchang and Liu Bowen exchanged a glance.
The two men really wanted to grab Zhu Biao and ask him, "Do you even know what 'incidentally' means?"
If it were said that Yang the Madman was deliberately tormenting people, no one in the entire court would doubt it.
But to say that his memorial was aimed at the reform of local county governments, and that he only mentioned the reform of the imperial court as a side note?
Even a three-year-old wouldn't believe it!
Li Shanchang took the Emperor Zhu's letter and Yang Shaofeng's memorial from the eunuch, read them carefully, and then handed them to Liu Bowen.
"Brother Qingtian, your Censorate is going to be very busy this time."
Li Shanchang said with a hint of schadenfreude, "From the Censorate in the capital to the Censorate in the Provincial Administration Commission, and then to the Censorate in each prefecture and county, the manpower of your Censorate..."
Liu Bowen's face immediately darkened.
Did I provoke Yang the Madman?
Nothing.
Why did I give up my perfectly good position as the Left Censor-in-Chief of the Censorate to provoke Yang the Madman and end up making myself miserable?
I'm not stupid!
So even though I didn't provoke him, Yang the Madman still extended his reach to the Censorate.
Liu Bowen grew angrier the more he thought about it, and couldn't help but snort, "Reforming the Censorate is not difficult, as long as the Imperial Son-in-Law can get me enough censors."
Li Shanchang, equally dark-faced, said, “Your Highness, according to what the Emperor said in his letter, and the memorials prepared by the Imperial Son-in-Law, I’m afraid the court will also undergo a large-scale reform, and even the local government offices such as the Provincial Administration Commission, prefectures, and counties will have to follow suit.”
“Especially the Provincial Administration Commission and its offices.”
“The structure of these two government offices is different from that of the imperial court and also different from that of local prefectures and counties.”
"If we are to carry out reforms, we must start with the Six Ministries of the Imperial Court, then the Provincial Administration Commissions and Prefectures, and finally the State and County governments."
"But once it involves restructuring..."
Li Shanchang immediately put on the mask of pain and said through gritted teeth, "There will be a period of chaos between the imperial court and the provincial administration, and there will also be a period of chaos between the prefectures and counties."
"Lower-level government offices don't know which higher-level government office to contact, and higher-level government offices don't know which area they should be responsible for."
"Understanding the ins and outs of this is not something that can be done overnight."