Wanli Youming

Chapter 87
Mergers of fields were not limited to gentry. In localities, especially where clans were concentrated, the phenomenon of land mergers by suzerains and vassals was often more serious.

Because suzerains often have legal privileges, according to past practice, unless they rebel, they will not be executed.

Therefore, suzerains and vassals tend to become more and more unscrupulous because of this. In history, many suzerains and vassals even directly bullied the market and even set up checkpoints to collect taxes.

In short, in Daming, whoever the emperor pampered would become a more rampant group of forces.

Zhu Yijun had no intention of pampering the vassal.

Even Zhu Yijun had long thought of rectifying the suzerain-vassal system.

It's not just about cracking down on the vassal's behavior of accumulating money and breaking the law.

More importantly, to give suzerains and vassals a new way out, they cannot only be raised like pigs, and they can only make money by bullying the people to search for people's wealth, instead of doing other things and making money in other ways.

But now, most of the interests of foreign trade are controlled by powerful families; the imperial court can only increase the internal interests of the people for the national treasury, and can raise soldiers and generals, and then have the strength to distribute external interests in the future. So that suzerains and vassals can benefit from the distribution of external interests.

Therefore, if the vassals obstruct the implementation of Qingzhang Tianmu's New Deal and refuse to give some of the internal benefits to the court, then Zhu Yijun, the emperor, will not be polite.

"Owl head?"

Zhu Tingpu looked at the imperial decree above his head in astonishment, muttered, and then denied it flatly: "Impossible! This is absolutely impossible! How could there be a reason to kill the clan?! This is definitely Zhang Juzheng's correction." Edict!"

Ru Zongshun just had a sullen face, and then ordered: "Immediately punish Zhu Tingfu!"

"Yes!"

A sergeant held Zhu Tingpu down.

But Zhu Tingpu struggled and shouted loudly: "I want to see Your Majesty! I want to see Your Majesty!"

Swish!
With a knife fell.

Immediately, Zhu Tingpu's head rolled bloody and fell in front of the other clan disciples.

At this point, Zhu Tingpu was decapitated.

At the same time, Zhu Jun's coffin was also put on shackles, locked in a prison car, and taken to Fengyang.

The disciples of the clan in Datong were all horrified by this.

None of them expected that the imperial court would take the real action and directly execute the sons of the clan who were good at killing officials.

However, because of this, the following clan members in the Datong area did not dare to fight against the New Deal, and honestly cooperated with the court's Qingzhang Tianmu affairs.

And as the news of Zhu Tingpu's being the head of the owl spread to other parts of the country, the clan's children in other places were also greatly shocked by it, and they all had to quiet down, not daring to obstruct Qingzhang Tianmu's affairs in the slightest.

The vassal kings did not rebel because of this, as Zhu Yijun expected. Perhaps for the vassal kings, it is not worth rebelling just because of a Qingzhang farm.

After all, Qingzhang Tianmu is not ruthless, just let them spit out the extra land, not force them to pay food and taxes.

In fact, the same is true for the gentry and gentry. Qingzhang Tianmu can bear it, and Kaihai can also bear it, as long as the court does not crack down on smuggling and does not cancel their preferential exemption.

After all, the latter is the root of their interests in controlling most of the world's goods.

Of course, they still suffer a lot from Qingzhang’s land. Firstly, they have to spit out the seized land, and secondly, they have to pay full taxes on the newly added land beyond the preferential exemption, and cannot pass it on to ordinary people.

It's just that the failure of the Fuque incident last time made them realize that the queen mothers of the two palaces could not stop Zhang Juzheng's will to carry out reforms, so they had to endure it temporarily.

"Since the officials of the north and the south disagree on the one-whip law, they will not be enforced nationwide, and all localities will be allowed to decide according to local conditions. If it is convenient for the people to pay money, they will pay the silver, and if it is convenient for them to pay the grain, they will pay the grain."

When Qingzhang Tianmu was implemented throughout the country, Zhang Juzheng suddenly asked Zhu Yijun to implement the same whip method throughout the country based on his experience in promoting the one-whip method in the south.

But the one-whip law has been criticized by many northern officials.

Many people in the north believe that the one-whip method is not conducive to the north where commercial activities are underdeveloped and the yield per mu is small. Blindly converting taxes and grains into silver will help the people in the south to pay taxes and grains with silver earned from sideline businesses, but it will increase the exploitation of northern farmers. , will make the northern people have to increase the burden of exchanging grain for silver.

Therefore, Zhu Yijun did not approve Zhang Juzheng's proposal.

"Your Majesty, a single whip is passed throughout the country, which is beneficial to the general collection of taxes and food. The servants can also be assigned according to the size of the land. The silver is collected according to the size of the land and the silver is collected according to the mu. The government pays the silver and hires the servants. The big family can be exempted from unnecessary expenses. See the head of the village for the solution. Fees can be avoided to avoid fraudulent entrustment, etc.;”

"The rich get relief, but the poor don't get an extra."

"Furthermore, there are regulations on silver and books are easy to check."

"And if this law is not implemented throughout the country, there will be no such convenience."

"Although there is not enough money in the north, the tax in the north has always been light, and a whip will not make it difficult for the people to bear."

Zhang Juzheng argued hard.

Zhu Yijun asked rhetorically: "Sir, do you really think that the price of silver will be a fixed rule? Will it not rise when taxes are paid and fall when taxes are not paid?"

Zhang Juzheng did not answer.

Then, Zhu Yijun said: "The north is bitter and cold, and the output is small. The tax is not as good as that of the south, which makes a large number of wealthy households migrate to the south. In the future, the desolation in the north will become even more serious!"

"It is an inevitable trend in the future to convert physical objects into cash and other currencies, but sir, don't worry about it!"

At this time, Zhu Yijun suddenly said something to Zhang Juzheng, and said: "But if the whole country wants to pay the cash in kind, that is to practice a whip method, we have to wait until there are silver coins in the north in the future!"

"And this silver coin cannot be simply equated with silver taels, at least its price must be controlled by the imperial court, so as to prevent the rightist from manipulating its price and taking the opportunity to exploit the people."

"So before the real silver coin of the country is determined, the local government must allow the people to continue to pay taxes in kind, and strictly prohibit all taxpayers from imposing silver taxes!"

"silver?"

Zhang Juzheng did not expect that Emperor Zhu Yijun was not only thinking about converting real objects into silver when collecting taxes, but also about controlling silver coins, and he didn't want big households to have the opportunity to exploit the people by manipulating the price of silver.

Zhang Juzheng had nothing to say, so he could only say yes, instead of insisting on implementing a whip, he accepted the emperor's request and only asked the local governments to act according to the actual conditions of their respective governing places.

Zhu Yijun continued: "What the imperial court needs to establish as soon as possible is a silver coin that can be circulated throughout the country. It is best to use silver as the main silver coin. After all, there is not enough copper, and paper money has been abused too much. It is difficult to gain the trust of the people in a short time; Therefore, sir, you need to spend more time on this, gather a group of excellent craftsmen, and see if you can smelt silver coins that are not easy to be imitated but mixed with a certain amount of other substances."

"The minister obeys the order!"

(End of this chapter)