"That's not a problem. Your Majesty, in your opinion, you can let the officials and gentry sell their vacant fields to the court as official farms, and then the court will allocate these fields to self-cultivators with less land, or to those with wealthy labor forces. When farmers apply for contracting, of course, the officials and gentry do not have to sell, but they have to be on guard against forcing the common people to become tenants."
Fang Congzhe said at this time.
Zhu Youxiao nodded and said with a smile: "What Yuan Fu said is true! Just do it like this!"
Fang Congzhe was obviously very good at figuring out Emperor Zhu Youxiao's thoughts, and knowing that the emperor wanted to curb land annexation or even reduce the phenomenon of land annexation, he also suggested that the gentry sell their vacant land to the court.
Yuan Keli glanced at Fang Congzhe because of this. He had to admit that compared to Fang Congzhe, he was still worse at pleasing the emperor.
…
"Song Gong must already know the imperial decree's treatment of captured tenant farmers, right?"
Huang Liji asked Song Quan with a depressed look.
Song Quan nodded and said: "All the troublemaking tenants will be exiled. However, in this case, who will cultivate our fields? What's more, many of these tenants are our clansmen and friends of the officials and gentry, and they are the foundation for our officials and gentry to fight against the government in the local area. ! Now, if these tenant farmers are exiled, it will damage the foundation of our officials and gentry."
"Who says otherwise? Those officials, gentry and tenant farmers who are causing trouble behind the scenes have never fought against Your Majesty! However, His Majesty's methods are really ruthless. He first suppresses them brutally, regardless of their reputation, and then exiles all the captured tenant farmers. , let your official and gentry power be dismembered!"
Huang Liji replied with a wry smile.
At this moment, Huang Liji heard crying coming from outside.
"Excuse me!"
Huang Liji had no choice but to say something to Song Quan, then walked out of his pavilion, called his housekeeper Qin Rui and asked, "What's going on?"
Qin Rui hurriedly replied: "Back to you, sir! Scholars from the same town came to Beijing with a group of tenant farmers from our Huang family. They said they also followed these officials and gentry tenant farmers from Shuntian Prefecture to participate in yesterday's trouble. Now they have several relatives and friends. They were all caught and said to be exiled, and now they come to you and ask for your help!"
After hearing this, Huang Liji suddenly broke into a cold sweat and shouted: "What nonsense are you talking about! Our tenant farmers have always abided by the rules, how dare they come to Beijing to make trouble! Besides, my Huang family has always been law-abiding, how can I be blamed for being an official? We have to pay the grain together and work as errands to go against the imperial court! Those people outside must be making false accusations against my Huang family, drive them away! No, let someone tie them up and send them to the government."
"yes!"
The butler hurriedly replied.
Soon, several tenants of the Huang family who came to see Huang Liji were very angry when they learned that Huang Liji refused to help them.
Someone directly scolded: "Huang! When you graduated from school, you still relied on the money my father borrowed from your family. Now you have donated your land to you. How come you are now rich and don't recognize anyone else!"
"That's right, this time we are here to speak for you scholars, why don't you come out and speak for us!"
"Yes! Didn't you gentlemen say that the imperial court would not do anything to the people? How come the people from the West Factory just bombarded us!"
Then, others started questioning him.
Huang Liji was a little troubled and couldn't help but come back and said to Song Quan: "I didn't instruct them to go against the imperial court, so why do you still blame me for coming? These are really unruly people!"
"What Mr. Huang is saying is that these unreasonable people are so unreasonable! Do you think that if you say a few words to the scholars, the scholars will have to disobey the court? How ridiculous!"
Song Quan smiled as he spoke.
At this time, Huang Liji's housekeeper Qin Rui had already brought the Huang family slaves outside and shouted to these tenants: "Whatever nonsense, I will tie them up and send them to the government!"
…
Huang Liji is not the only civil servant to do this.
Although these village warriors gathered to protest for the sake of scholars.
However, the scholars who were already working as officials or studying in the capital did not buy their account. They were even eager to distance themselves from them, and even took the initiative to arrest the troubled tenant farmers to the government.
Therefore, nothing happened to the tenant farmers in the end. Even if some tenant farmers wanted to rebel, they were informed to the government by the officials and gentry from the same town, and they were suppressed by the government.
The officials and gentry behaved very cowardly and inconsistently in this incident.
There was nothing he could do about it. The class stance of the official gentry determined that it was impossible for him to fall out with the court for the sake of the tenant farmers.
After all, they still need to rely on the imperial court to maintain their other interests.
Therefore, except for ordinary scholars like Jiang Hede and Gao Eryan who were executed for participating in the agitation, most of the officials and gentry in Beizhili were not implicated because of this demonstration by local heroes, and continued to actively write to His Majesty the Emperor. The New Year's greetings for the seventh year of the Apocalypse naturally contain many beautiful words.
The tenant farmers who participated in the riots were in a worse situation. They had to tie their hands and then boarded ships in batches to go to Taiwan and Nagasaki, leaving their homes.
Some of them felt angry because of this, feeling that the officials had betrayed them and harmed them, but there was nothing they could do.
"I heard that Huang Liji, Wei Zaode and all the court officials took the initiative to send the troublemaking tenants who came to them to the government?"
In the Political Affairs Hall, Zhu Youxiao also asked Fang Congzhe about this matter.
Fang Congzhe smiled and replied: "Your Majesty, this is indeed the case."
Zhu Youxiao nodded: "We all know how to measure. The Shuntian Prefecture's policy of paying grain and serving as errands for both officials and gentry has been implemented. Once the Shuntian Prefecture is over, we will first implement the policy of paying grain and serving errands for both officials and gentry in Shanxi, and then in Shandong Shaanxi, all the way to the whole country.”
"When the officials and gentry pay the grain together, in the opinion of the ministers, we should reform the commercial tax. Now in the world, especially in Jiangnan, the people are no longer mainly agricultural, and the commercial tax should start to become the main tax source of the Ming Dynasty."
Yuan Keli said something at this time.
After hearing this, Fang Conzhe glanced at Yuan Keli. He knew that Yuan Keli's sudden increase in business tax was aimed at him.
Zhu Youxiao also saw this and knew it in his heart, but he intended to let the civilian gentry and the civil servants who emerged from the merchant gentry class check and balance each other. And now the civilian gentry on Yuan Keli's side has some benefits because the officials and gentry pay the same salary as the official. If he suffered losses, he naturally needed to support the civilian gentry and attack the business gentry, and said: "Business tax must be changed! Yuan Fu then presided over a court meeting attended by the cabinet and ministers. Let’s discuss business tax matters.”
"I obey the order! However, there is something else I need to report to Your Majesty right now."
Fang Congzhe replied.
"speak!"
Zhu Youxiao had to admit that as he became more and more powerful as the emperor, the overt and covert struggles among ministers became much more subtle than in Wanli Taichang and when he came to the throne. Everyone was very cautious and disciplined, unlike before. , impeachment in a hurry, even crying and remonstrating at every turn, and political opponents are either dead or alive, regardless of whether they are in the same party or not, right or wrong.
He found that even though Fang Congzhe did not want the commercial tax issue raised by Yuan Keli to be discussed further, he did not directly object and refute it, but changed the topic.
"What I want to report is that the emperor's eldest son is now four years old. I don't know whether he should go out to study. I would like to ask for your Majesty's advice."
Fang Congzhe asked.
The ministers present were all shocked after hearing this. They did not expect that Fang Congzhe would suddenly mention this.
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