Xinmin County, a large county 60 kilometers away from Mukden, has never been the focus of attention from all sides. This "noble land" that Zhang Zuolin was recruited in the past, thus leaping from a beard to a soldier who ate imperial food, and then rose in the turbulent changes at the beginning of the Republic of China, is about to accept the rise of the next generation.

There was once a rumor that Zhang Dashuai before his career was asked by the Xinmin prefect why he was recruited, and Zhang Zuolin replied like this: "In order to be promoted and make a fortune." Now, his eldest son is going to wash away the rumors and glorify his father.

The reason why Xinmin was chosen is still a bit of consideration: there is a direct railway to the provincial capital of Fengtian, although it was built by the Japanese, but it is also the earliest railway built in the Northeast except for the Middle East Road. Because of the convenient transportation and proximity to the provincial capital, it can take care of family, military management and administrative work. You must know that the newlywed Yan'er is a good time for young couples to be nostalgic, and to do so, the family and career are taken care of.

Secondly, there are some considerations: at the forefront of the struggle between Zhang Zuolin and Feng Delin, the placement of the Guards Brigade, including the Guards Brigade, is a strong support for the 27th Division; Xinmin was the farthest county from Fengtian, and it was not only under Zhang Zuolin's effective control, but also far away from the hostility of some people in Fengtian City towards his sudden attack---- Zhang Hanqing's rise was too fast to adapt to such a force standing alone in the 27th Division.

The reason why Zhang Hanqing is so enthusiastic and insists on carrying out this high-risk experiment when his foundation is unstable ---- he himself is full of confidence, but others do not see it that way---- he is also eager to have his own voice in politics. His roots are very shallow, and he is only a nominal senior senator in the Overseer's Administration, and as for the people who follow him, especially a bunch of pens, he has no power or office.

If you want to make your voice heard in politics, you can't do it without a group of people, and even the future generations will advocate team spirit when doing great things. Therefore, as the person in charge of the land reform experiment, Zhang Hanqing is also trying to replace the original one with a new administrative system, which is the prototype of the centralized system.

The former county magistrate and deputy county magistrate have been vacated by his people, and he is also using this opportunity to train his future civil service system, and by the way, also test their ability.

Since 20 August, rumors have been heard in the streets and alleys and in villages near and far that the government wants to give land to the peasants free of charge. Although some large landowners tried their best to distinguish between them, the rumors were confirmed when the land working group arranged by Zhang Hanqing went deep into the villages of the county and began to publicize the Xinmin land reform to all walks of life. The new county magistrate Xiao Zhang is really going to take land for free for the people! This news revived the earth like a spring breeze, and the people of Xinmin spread it from mouth to mouth.

Who is County Magistrate Xiao Zhang? That's the eldest son of the Overseer and Inspector, a man of his word! Didn't he take his subordinates to exterminate more than 3,000 steppe beards some time ago? I heard from the businessmen from the Zhengjiatun area that the dead bodies were burned in strings, and the sky above Zhengjiatun was full of smoke! The living beards did not let them eat idle, I heard that some of them were driven to build horse farms, and the other part were driven to build ditches and water conservancy, so they said that they should be transformed into adults by labor? These gangs are harmful, and now they can bear it!

Zhang Hanqing is actually not a county magistrate, but an assistant county magistrate, but he has another self-appointed title, the chairman of the Xinmin Land Reform Committee, and the vice chairmen are Guo Songling and Wang Yizhe. This committee has a women's movement committee, chaired by Han Shuxiu; set up a Land Dispute Mediation and Judicial Committee, headed by Wu Jiaxiang, Cheung Hanqing's secretary; set up a propaganda committee, the director is Zhu Guangmu; Set up the chairman of the executive committee, which is the main part of the work, concurrently served by Guo Songling, and consists of four groups: measurement, grading, registration and inventory; A policy committee was set up, concurrently served by Wang Yizhe, who was responsible for summarizing and correcting the actions of the entire land reform, and forming a systematic document.

The reason why he was able to carry out this unprecedented campaign was precisely based on a theory, and it was also the dream of "realizing the cultivator's land" advocated by the Republic of China. What should the government do if it spends money to "buy" the land from the landlords and distribute it to the peasants "for free"? Who dares to say anything!

The autumn harvest is still a month away, and the working group's propaganda is that the land will be allocated before the autumn harvest, which is a big job. The reason for this is that Zhang Hanqing has many ideas.

It has only been a few years since the founding of the Republic of China, and many rules and systems are not perfect, especially in rural areas. Many landlords have secretly joined hands with the government authorities to make a big fuss about the scale of land, and there are many people who use good to make up for it and conceal their land in order to pay less land tax. Since the practice of "Xinmin Land Reform" is more or less detrimental to many landlords, Zhang Hanqing worries that some people will temporarily give up the ownership of some fields after the autumn harvest to avoid paying taxes because of concerns about taxes. When faced with the crops that are about to be harvested, these people will not make such a decision, but will facilitate the working group of the Land Reform Commission to measure the land and assess the merits of the land.

In fact, there is a more special reason that has not been explained, that is, Xiao Zhang also wants to get some benefits in this cleanup. The various expenditures and production investments of the "military-to-civilian" are too large, and now he can make a fortune, so how can he let go of these low-hanging fruit properties?

The main methods of the "Xinmin Land Reform" are:

1. It is stipulated that the right to the land belongs to the state, and the Xinmin County Government recognizes the use status (right of first refusal) of the land legally owned by the individual. The township and village governments in Xinmin area have set up "land reform committees" to sub-charge tasks such as measuring land, assessing land prices, registering according to capitation, and obtaining "land use certificates". Depending on the land conditions of the new people, all cultivated land is divided into three grades: superior, medium and poor. The tax is based on the output value of medium land, 1.2 times for superior land, and 20% for poor land. The status of the registered real estate will be reviewed once in the following year, and if it is correct, it will not be changed in a measurement and allocation cycle (10 years) to reduce the workload.

2. Limit the amount of land owned by individuals on the basis of 5 mu per capita, and if the original land of farmers does not exceed this amount, this part will be taxed at the rate of 1 out of 10; The part made up by the government shall be taxed at 20%. There are two options for the remaining 5 acres beyond the decree: one is to purchase it by the Xinmin County Government by way of redemption (based on the price base of about 20 yuan/standard field at the beginning of 1916), and the required expenses will be amortized over 10 years. ---- this is actually the idea of borrowing the chicken and laying the egg: the autonomous government does not pay the money to receive the land tax as fiscal revenue to support the industry, and then amortize the interest amount in installments with the industrial income tax. Later, it was appropriate to reduce the amount of government debt through currency devaluation, or to raise money through the issuance of bonds by the government. This is called agricultural subsidy industry, and industry feeds back agriculture. The second is to be taxed according to the file, and the part that does not exceed 5 mu is levied 20% tax, and 5 mu and 10 mu are levied 20% and 5, and gradually accumulate and rise, with the highest upper limit of 50%. With the harvest situation at that time, it was basically an unbearable weight to this extent, and it was estimated that the big landowners would have to cut down their warehouses in tears.

3. For the peasants who are currently landless, and the unemployed who have been reformed (bandits with less sinful crimes), the Xinmin County Government allocates 5 mu of converted standard land per capita, but the agricultural tax must be levied at about 2 out of 10 within 5 years, and the agricultural tax will fall back to 10% from the sixth year onwards. At present, the agricultural tax here is based on the method of paying in kind, and its level is based on the standard output of ordinary one mu of land in Xinmin area, and then the amount of tax to be paid is calculated according to the proportion. Because the monetary situation in the northeast region is very different, in the early days, Xinmin, as a pilot of land reform, first set up a grain bureau to sell the grain collected that year by the policy---- because of inconvenient transportation, some farmers also sold their surplus grain to the grain bureau. The grain bureau then uniformly sold grain at a high price outside the customs and abroad to obtain greater profits. As a result of this method, the government's revenue has increased significantly, and the collection of grain is more affordable than the collection of money---- because the price of grain outside the customs has risen. Later, after the popularization of land reform, the grain in the three eastern provinces could not be sold for a long time, and the government also cracked down on grain exports, making the government monopolize the sales of grain and increase investment in industry---- the author encountered this situation in his hometown in the 80s, so the protagonist Zhang Hanqing can think of this method, and he will give the author extra points as appropriate.

4. In order to encourage the development of wasteland, the government also gives preferential policies of tax exemption for 5 years to farmers who take the initiative to open up wasteland, and appropriately gives relief to those who open up wasteland with agricultural materials and agricultural tools, and then will restore it to the same tax level as the original land of individuals---- pay 10% of the agricultural tax of the land harvest, of course, the excess part is still dealt with in accordance with the law Order 2.

5. The Agrarian Reform Commission shall purchase as many animals as possible for the convenience of its neighbours, and shall have agricultural implements and livestock for sale or lease in all townships and villages, and the rent shall be paid at one percent of the harvest of ordinary medium fields. If they are unwilling to rent and cannot afford to buy livestock, the Land Reform Commission can pay them on credit in advance, but the land tax will jump to 50% for each installment. There are thousands of war horses that were injured when they were suppressing bandits, and after they recovered, they were converted to agriculture because they could no longer be used as war horses---- Zhang Hanqing made another profit from them.

6. The Xinmin County Government allows the leasing and employment of land, but does not transfer or buy or sell land---- 2,000 years of experience has proved that if the door is opened to land annexation, a group of people with bright minds will always find a way to obtain land from the peasants, even if the establishment of each dynasty basically overthrows the old regime under the slogan of "equal land and free grain", it will still fall into the tide of peasant uprisings that lose their land and are displaced due to land annexation.

Of course, after entering the industrialized society, the use of land still needs to be intensive, Zhang Hanqing is well aware of the disadvantages of Juntian, but the current economic level has not developed to that point, or the method of "Juntian" can win the hearts of the people. In the absence of other means of subsistence, no one will automatically give up the land they own; Under the government's draconian decrees, the high progressive tax rate will also make people who have the opportunity to buy more than 5 acres of land per capita think twice.

In this way, to a certain extent, the desire of the rich for land annexation is avoided, and of course, a certain degree of policy support is given to the land that is actively cultivated. As a result, on the land of Xinmin, a vigorous round of land reform movement was unveiled.