Traveling through Du He, Li Chengqian's rebellion begins

Xiao Kai nodded with a smile on his face, then held his head high and followed Du He.

When Du He and Xiao Kai walked out of the Taiji Hall, they found Yu Chang, the Minister of Works, and three other doctors waiting outside.

When the four of them saw Du He coming out, they immediately clasped their fists and shouted.

"Du Shangshu."

Du He nodded at them, then waved his hand and said.

"let's go."

After returning to the Ministry of Works, Yu Chang immediately moved today's memorial to Du He's office and said respectfully in a low voice.

"Minister Du, except for the memorial from Cangzhou Governor Xue Dading, which is relatively important, the rest are minor matters."

"Yesterday afternoon, Xue Dading submitted another memorial. He said that there had not been a drop of rain in Cangzhou in the past two months, and the water level in the riverbed had dropped significantly. It was a good time to manage the river and canal."

"Xue Dading is leading a small number of people to clean up some sections of the river, but the progress is very slow due to lack of manpower."

"He hopes that the court will quickly approve his memorial and strive to clear the most blocked section of the canal this year."

As a governor, Xue Dading only had the power to mobilize a small number of corvée laborers to do work.

However, faced with a canal with deep silt accumulation and a relatively wide river channel, these dozens of corvées would never be able to clean it up even if they worked for an eternity.

Not to mention quarrying to reinforce river sections that are easily affected by floods.

Du He nodded and said, "Doctor Yu, I will write a memorial later and submit it to Hou You Pushe."

"If Hou You Pushe and His Majesty can approve it quickly, it can be completed today."

Although the Ministry of Works was an independent department, it was still under the management of the Secretariat. Therefore, Du He had to report to Hou Junji first regarding the suggestion of paying labor service.

If we can get Hou Junji's support, we can let him submit it to Li Shimin, and then make the final decision.

Du He then waved his hand and said, "You go down and lead the people in the various departments to work first. I will finish reviewing today's government affairs first, and then go to the Shangshu Province to find Hou You Pushe."

"promise!"

After Yu Chang saluted with his fists, he quickly left the office.

It then took Du He nearly half an hour to review the four memorials.

"Hey!"

"This memorial is long and boring. It's such a waste of time."

Du He looked at the four lengthy memorials, frowned helplessly and sighed.

The memorials written by these officials were nearly several hundred words long, but they were all useless preparations and ultimately just stated a simple thing.

Du He first put aside the four reviewed memorials, and then spent a cup of tea writing a memorial about wages for corvée labor.

After the ink on the paper dried, Du He put the memorial into his sleeve, then took the four memorials he had reviewed in his hand before walking out of the office.

Du He walked to Yu Chang's office, handed him the reviewed memorial, and gave him instructions in a deep voice.

"Minister Yu, please tell your subordinates to be concise and to the point when submitting memorials to me in the future."

"There is no need to include a lot of useless rhetoric and flattery in memorials."

Although he could not order the local officials to do so, he could save himself a lot of time by letting the officials of the Ministry of Works make corrections first.

Yu Chang's expression paused slightly, then he replied respectfully.

"As ordered!"

After Du He strode away, Yu Chang, full of doubts, opened the four memorials one by one and read them again.

"It's a well-written memorial, why doesn't Minister Du like it?"

As a person who loved calligraphy and literature, Yu Chang thought that the memorials written by these four officials were beautifully worded and pleasing to read.

He didn't understand why Du He, the Minister of Works, asked his officials to write in a simpler way.

If the memorials were not written carefully and the words were not ornate enough, wouldn't that lower the level of these literati?

It’s just that a higher-ranking official can crush a person, and since Du He has given him such an order, he has to carry it out even if he has to hold his nose.

After sighing for a while, Yu Chang went to inform his subordinates with a helpless look on his face.

Ministry of Industry lobby.

When the officials of the Ministry of Works heard the order conveyed by Yu Chang, instead of resisting, they cheered and rejoiced.

"Du Shangshu is wise!"

"Memorials should be concise and clear. We don't need to spend a lot of time thinking of words!"

"With this order from Minister Du, it will be much easier for us to write memorials in the future!"

"I didn't expect that soon after taking office, Minister Du solved such a big problem for us. I was worried that Minister Du was just a show-off."

After seeing his subordinates’ reactions that were completely different from what he had expected, Yu Chang’s face became stunned.

He originally thought that his subordinates would raise questions and protest, but he never expected this to be the result.

Yu Chang sighed in his heart: "It seems that I and the officials below still don't know enough!"

The fact that the young Du He could become the Minister of Works was not simply because of good fortune or luck, but because he really had some skills.

...

On the other side, Du He also went to Hou Junji's office.

After Hou Junji heard what Du He reported, his originally relaxed and happy mood instantly became tense.

He held the brief memorial submitted by Du He, and his hands began to tremble slightly with excitement.

After a moment of silence.

Hou Junji said jokingly, "Du He, how did you come up with the idea of paying the people who were doing corvée labor?"

"Could it be that you are a saint sent by God to plead for the people of the world?"

Since ancient times, free labor service has been a matter of course. Not to mention paying the people wages and providing them with meals, the people even have to bring their own dry food and tools.

This system, which has been maintained for thousands of years, has been deeply integrated into the blood of every Han Chinese and is deeply rooted.

And this kid Du He, instead of being a good playboy, is now thinking of breaking this rule. He is really looking for trouble.

After hearing Hou Junji's words, Du He put down the hot tea in his hand and replied seriously.

"Uncle Hou, how dare I ask the court to pay all the people who are doing corvée labor?"

"If it was just easy labor such as patrolling the streets and guarding the warehouse, it would be understandable that the court did not provide food and wages."

"But for a major project like the Wudigou project, the corvée labor is very heavy. There have always been cases where people died of exhaustion."

"Giving people some wages and providing them with food can also avoid causing public resentment."

Then Du He talked about how Emperor Yang of Sui conscripted 200 million laborers every month to build the eastern capital Luoyang, and also conscripted one million laborers to build the Western Garden and the Imperial Palace.

He also analyzed how the heavy corvee system led to large-scale uprisings among the people.

Hou Junji was so frightened by the bold examples Du He cited that his face suddenly changed.

He quickly called out in a low voice, "Stop, are you trying to kill yourself?"

In the 640th year of Zhenguan (100), Your Majesty ordered Yan Lide to build the Xiangcheng Palace in Linru County, Ruzhou for summer vacation, and mobilized more than one million laborers.

According to Du He's statement, isn't Your Majesty the same as Emperor Yang of Sui?