"Back to Bingye, the younger one only knows that the second master's family lives in Jurong County, and that he is Mr. Huang from the county, but the eldest master's family doesn't know. I heard that he is in Nanjing."
Many wealthy gentry and landlords in the Ming Dynasty played tricks of sending and flying.
Therefore, the nominal owner of a property may be different from the actual owner. The real owners of many fields are high-ranking officials and gentry from other places.
Some fields also have second owners and first owners.
It is precisely because the real landlords of many fields are high-ranking officials and gentry from other places, rather than the kind of farming society before the serious land annexation, that is, the situation where the landlords are mostly local landlords.
Therefore, compared with the local landlords, these foreign officials and gentry do not pay much attention to the friendship and clan friendship, nor are they willing to help the tenants or reduce rent and interest to benefit the tenants in times of disaster, but only They hope to increase exploitation as much as possible and only ask for more rent and interest, so the exploitation is even more serious.
This situation is most obvious in Jiangnan.
The local landlords are basically middle and lower class landlords and homesteaders, the so-called rich farmers.
Because it is difficult to become a big landowner just by annexing land locally.
If you want to become a big landowner, it is not enough to just annex in your hometown.
Therefore, the middle and lower class landlords and peasants are the foundation for the stability of a natural economic empire, equivalent to the middle class in later generations.
They have the motivation to actively maintain local grassroots stability for the court, and they are also the court's main source of tax revenue.
But generally speaking, the number of this group will become smaller and smaller, and they will either become homeless tenant farmers or become large landowners who occupy fertile land across counties.
The purpose of canceling preferential treatment and exemption is to avoid the reduction of the number of this group, ensure the long-term destiny of the country, and curb the merger of large landowners.
Therefore, Hai Rui, as an official who was also a small landowner, also supported this, and knew that ensuring that the interests of small landowners such as himself were not infringed would be conducive to the stability of the country.
After hearing this, Chen Yijiang had no choice but to let Xia Dongyang tell him the name of his second employer.
Next, Chen Yijiang continued to lead his patrol team to clean up other places in the area he was responsible for based on the intelligence.
boom!
boom!
boom!
Precisely because officers and soldiers from the patrol team such as Chen Yijiang and Hu Huaide were conducting raids everywhere, gunshots were heard everywhere in the Nanzhi area.
Rural bullies and thieves were shot one after another.
However, large-scale clearance operations were only carried out in the countryside.
Therefore, the big bureaucrats and gentry living in the city did not know much about the situation. They only just learned that Hai Rui had posted a notice that the National Tax Department would continue to supervise taxes, and that Jun had released the pro-military attaché Qi Jin. The order is given to Yingtianfu Yamen.
"This Hai Rui, why did he suddenly change his mind again!"
At this time, the wealthy gentleman Gu Bingren looked puzzled and asked Huo Weida, a bureaucrat's son who pretended to be a military guard and participated in the gang rape of a girl from the Ge family.
Huo Weida said: "I don't know. Lu Qianxian and several other officials have gone to the Governor's Yamen to inquire about the situation."
"But thinking about it, it may be related to Hai Rui learning that a Jin Yiwei came to Yangzhou to take people. He also guessed that the court's attitude was actually very tough, so he decided to continue to be tough to avoid being blamed by Jiang Ling. It may also be that he knew about it in advance. Attitude!"
"Forget it, no more guessing!"
Gu Bingren waved his hand, said something, and then said: "There is no turning back when you start a bow. There are some things we have done, and there is no reason to stop. Otherwise, we will only be despised by these officials and the court. We feel that we Local officials and gentry can really do whatever they want!"
"Go ahead and let us send out domestic slaves who pretend to be military guards or directly become thieves and bandits, and the local ruffians whom we send to bribe them, to continue to launch civil uprisings and continue to abandon the farmland and strike the market!"
"He Hai Rui only has tens of thousands of soldiers and guards to rely on, and the rest are just ignorant people who are as ignorant as sand and are cowardly and afraid of death. It's okay for him to make decisions for them, but do he really expect them to make decisions for him?"
"But as far as the students know, Hai Rui has been letting pro-military guards contact and train the villagers from the beginning, and now he has set up patrol teams to hunt down thieves and bandits everywhere."
Hovida said.
"I can only maintain stability in the countryside!"
"We still control prefectures, counties and other big cities and even some big towns. Which big household doesn't have hundreds or thousands of domestic slaves or hundreds of thousands of hired workers? Plus the people of their respective tribes, it can be said that in addition to The government offices are not ours, everything else is ours, and Hai Rui wants to eliminate the civil uprising without relying on tens of thousands of pro-military guards and a few organized people's strongholds, at least it's not that easy!"
"No matter how you put it, the advantage is on our side!"
"He, Hai Rui, only has one person, and we all have the support of many powerful people openly and secretly. We all have more money and food than he can mobilize, but Hai Rui is not really willing to transfer the court's money and food to those untouchables! Then! Why else would he change the system?"
Gu Bingren started talking at this time.
After hearing this, Howeida nodded and said, "Then let them continue to cause trouble?"
Gu Bingren nodded.
…
Hai Rui refused to see Sun Guangyou, Lu Huo and others because of his illness. Instead, he stayed in the backyard, eating sweet-scented osmanthus cake to satisfy his hunger, while giving orders to Lu Kun, Tang Chuanxun and others:
"In the name of this hall, I would like to request the imperial court to abolish all lowly registrations, register households for all Dan people, and exempt them from Ding Yin for one year. If they can actively participate in rent reduction and interest reduction activities, and still take care of their meals, those who have made meritorious deeds will be rewarded. Silver, and even be awarded the title of inspector and other officers of the Inspection and Inspection Department on the spot!"
"However, don't delay farming and fortification work, and participate in clean-up operations and rent and interest reduction activities while working."
"The emperor has made up his mind, now we just need to win the support of the people."
After Hai Rui finished speaking, Lu Kun asked, "Where is the money and food needed to organize these activities?"
Hai Rui had already planned this, so he said: "Don't worry about money and food. Send an order to all prefectures and counties, asking them to take out all the food in Changpingcang and the money and food in the vassal treasury to advance the newly recruited people. After all the taxes from the officials and gentry are collected, we will make up for them. We have all the proofs in hand, so don’t worry."
"In addition, I would like to write another letter to the court, asking the court to allow us to select outstanding civilians in the patrol team as inspection officers and soldiers of the patrol department after restoring order in the area, and in some important towns where no court officials have been stationed, Create an additional inspection department!”
"Large cities and towns directly establish counties, and even ask the court to allow us to set up towns in some important cities and towns. It is the same as here, but it mainly governs new towns and allows us to directly select local scholars to act as county magistrates and governors. Officials are in charge of these towns, or officials are stationed at the local level!"
"The south of the Yangtze River is rich and has a large population, especially unemployed people. There are also many new towns and new shops that have emerged, but there are also many big officials, gentry and big bureaucrats. Many places are even dominated by expatriates!"
“Many places are only managed by a few wealthy businessmen with big country gentry backgrounds. However, these wealthy businessmen only focus on plundering or monopolizing the market. They do not actively maintain local stability. They even team up with the common people to fight against the court’s tax differentials. In the event of a disaster, most of them are foreign businessmen. Instead of actively providing disaster relief like traditional clans, the people took this opportunity to hoard and annex their fields, forcing more farmers to go bankrupt and become refugees, becoming their hired laborers."
"The imperial court cannot really allow the gentry to govern themselves just to save money!"
"The autonomy of the gentry can never be compared to the imperial court. Most of the gentry do not care about the long-term stability of the entire world;"
“Even the local gentry mostly only know how to protect their own place, but are not active in paying taxes, and their sense of responsibility for disaster relief is not as good as that of the imperial government. At least they cannot coordinate, and at most they only pay more attention to their own local disaster relief. Be positive.”
"Especially in Jiangnan, most of them are high-ranking officials and gentry, and they don't care if there is chaos outside the city!"
"In short, since we are going to carry out a bloody campaign, we can't let the blood flow in vain. Let's take this opportunity to send more officials to take charge of the livelihood of more people, assume more functions of maintaining the national destiny, and open up more Tax sources come out.”
Hai Rui then gave instructions again, but he did not say that his plans actually came from the instructions given to him by Zhu Yijun.
When Hai Rui arranged this, the local die-hard right-wingers indeed instigated slaves, local ruffians and even bandits to start causing trouble. They also began to make the major tenant farmers and merchants under their control abandon farming and go on strike.
Only this time, the slaves and local ruffians they ordered did not succeed.
It was a sunny day in golden autumn. Outside Moling Pass, a group of merchants had just been intercepted by a group of ruffians pretending to be pro-military guards. A patrol team led by Zhong Changdong who was plowing gathered from the farmland nearby and rushed in. Come over, pick up the firearms, spears, broadswords, wooden shields and other guys hidden in the haystacks, rush in, and kill these ruffians to the ground.
And after Hai Rui learned that some people were going on strike in the city and even intimidating small merchants to go on strike, he also ordered some patrol teams to be dispatched to the city, began to strengthen city management, maintain business order, and forced some grain stores and other stores controlled by large households to open, or directly Let the eunuchs of the inner court set up grain stores and other imperial stores to open markets to meet the daily needs of urban residents.
Bang!
A large grain store in Shangyuan County was forcibly broken into by a patrol team led by Li Juexian, who had just arrived in Shangyuan County.
Wang Gangui, the second owner of this big grain store, came out of the backyard of the grain store with a dozen thugs and shouted: "Who are you? You dare to break into our grain store? Do you know where our big boss family comes from!" "
"No matter what the background of your boss is, if you go on strike now, you are rebelling, you are a traitor, and you should be punished!"
Li Jue finished speaking first and then stepped aside, and immediately a group of firearmsmen took aim at Wang Qiangui.
Bang bang!
Before Wang Qiangui had time to beg for mercy, he was beaten full of holes.
Li Jue came over first and asked, "Who are the shopkeeper and accountant?"
Two middle-aged men in cloth shirts immediately knelt down: "We are!"
"This grain store is already owned by thieves and has lost its official registration. It will be auctioned soon, but before being auctioned, it belonged to the governor's office!"
"Therefore, I order you to open the market immediately with an official letter from the Governor! And you are not allowed to raise prices indiscriminately, otherwise, you will also be punished as a traitor!"
As he spoke, Li Jue took out Hai Rui's official letter and gave orders.
The shopkeeper and accountant hurriedly agreed and opened the market immediately.
For a time, many right-wing forces in the southeast were suppressed by the patrol team.
(End of chapter)
