Before that, Yuan Shikai had a thorny problem to solve, that is, Xiong Xiling and his "celebrity cabinet". Although Xiong Xiling has always obeyed Yuan Shikai, he can be described as "conscientious and go all out". But after all, it has lost its use value, and its existence has become an obstacle.

Yuan Shikai resorted to his usual killer trick - forging the "Rehe Palace Treasure Theft Case" and blaming Xiong Xiling.

As a result, several influential newspapers in Beijing, such as "New Society Daily" and "Qunqiang Daily", suddenly published the news that Xiong Xiling had stolen the antiques of Rehe Palace.

A shocking piece of news was published by name: "Xiong Xiling, the current prime minister, has taken out more than 200 pieces of ancient porcelain, calligraphy and paintings from the former Qing Dynasty Palace during the reunification of the Rehe Prefecture, and has asked a lawyer to file a lawsuit with the Jingshi District Office."

In the past few days, a large amount of space has been devoted to the front page to the news of Xiong Xiling's suspected "treasure theft case," and various newspapers have also published comments.

Dignified Country. Business. Total. Li was openly related to the treasure theft case, and the newspapers showed no mercy, causing a sensation inside and outside the capital.

What exactly is the "treasure robbery case"? Yuan Shikai knows better than anyone else.

Xiong Xiling also knew that all this was planned by Yuan Shikai behind the scenes, so he had to admit that he was unlucky.

The "treasure theft case" has become a problem for Xiong Xiling, and he wanted to come forward to defend himself in order to preserve his personality. But there are some things that are inconvenient to talk about, and many things that are difficult to explain clearly. For example, although he did not take more than 200 cultural relics from the Rehe Palace, he took a paper fan from there and gave it to Jiang Gui.

If it is not true that he did not take a single piece himself, who would believe it if he only took one and gave it away? Besides, the snow flakes in Yanshan are as big as a seat, and it is not an exaggeration to have snow in Yanshan. If you take one piece, you will not be wronged. If you want to be an upright person, don't do any bad things, Xiong Xiling at this time, how embarrassing and embarrassing the situation is.

Xiong Xiling, who was originally a scholar, was neither disdainful of refutation nor indifferent by nature, so he could only resign in February 1914 in anger.

Sure enough, after Xiong Xiling resigned, the lively "treasure theft case" quickly ended, and the newspaper articles about treasure theft disappeared.

After Xiong Xiling's resignation, Wang Daxie, the chief of education, and Liang Qichao, the chief of justice, resigned one after another, and the "celebrity cabinet," which had only been established for half a year, collapsed.

The Constitution of the Republic of China also stipulates that the legislature shall adopt a unicameral system, and in addition to the Legislative Yuan, a separate "Senate" shall be established as an advisory organ to the president. The Organic Law of the Legislative Yuan and the Law on the Election of Members were enacted by the Legislative Assembly. Before the establishment of the Legislative Yuan, the Senate shall act as its substitute.

With regard to the constitutional issue, after the establishment of the Senate, the Senate elected a 10-member Constitution Drafting Committee to complete the drafting of the Constitution, which was examined and approved by the Senate and submitted by the President to the National Assembly for resolution and promulgation.

The Organic Law of the Senate and the National Assembly is enacted by the Legislative Council, which is directly appointed by the President and convened and dissolved by the President.

In the course of discussing the "Constitution of the Republic of China", the audience was full of promises, and only one member of parliament objected, and he was Zhang Qiqiang.

Zhang is a native of Guilin, Guangxi, the word Ziwu, born in Jinshi, in the late Qing Dynasty, he served as the commander of the Southern Military Army in Hunan, and had a very personal relationship with Tan Yanmin.

He objected to the president's right to bestow knighthoods, because such a president was too much like an emperor.

As soon as his opinion was raised, he was booed by the audience. He walked away without mentioning his resignation or leave, and ran back to the south.

This frightened his protector Li Jingxi to submit a request for punishment.

Yuan Shikai approved the eight words "chase back to Beijing and hand over to the ministry" on the submission.

After the promulgation of the New Testament, the State Department was officially abolished, and the Secretary of State replaced the Prime Minister. The Secretary of State is just a clerk under the President, which is the same as the General Cabinet of Ministers. There is a huge disparity in the status of Li.

The term secretary of state was moved from the U.S. bureaucracy, and it is an official position of Japanese translator, so it seems that it is not the same in the first place. However, Yuan Shikai was very interested in the word "Qing", because Qing often came from the emperor's mouth, and Yuan Shikai had a special complex for this "Qing".

On May 1, the third year of the Republic of China, on the day the law was promulgated, Yuan ordered the revocation of the country. Business. At the same time, a government hall was set up in the presidential palace and Xu Shichang was appointed secretary of state.

Sun Baoqi is the chief of foreign affairs, Zhu Qichuan is the chief of internal affairs, Zhou Ziqi is the chief of finance, Duan Qirui is the chief of the army, Liu Guanxiong is the chief of the navy, Zhang Zongxiang is the chief of justice, Liang Dunyan is the chief of communications, Tang Hualong is the chief of education, and Zhang Jian is the chief of agriculture and commerce.

The main department of this list is still the members of the Bear cabinet, leaving only two cold yamen positions for the Progressive Party.

Xu Shichang was called Xiangguo, and the political hall set up one person on the left and one on the left, with Yang Shiqi as the left minister, and Qian Nengxun, Xu's former subordinate of Shichang, as the right letter. Zhang Yixuan is the director of the Confidential Bureau of the Political Affairs Hall.

The Generalissimo Office of the Army and Navy was also set up, with Yin Chang, Wang Shizhen, and Sa Zhenbing as clerks.

The secretary of the presidential office was renamed the Inner History. Secretary-General Liang Shiyi resigned and was reappointed as the supervisor of the Taxation Department. Deputy Secretary-General Ruan Zhongshu was promoted to Chief of Internal History, and Zeng Yijin and Wang Shitong were appointed Deputy Directors of Internal History.

As a result of this change, the relatively independent cabinet has been transformed into the president's "Enlightenment Office."

Liang Shiyi left the presidential palace, but he held the power of national taxation and was still a powerful and powerful person.

There are two people who are the saddest, one is the **** speaker Li Jingxi, who came to Beijing just to be a country. Business. Total. I can't imagine that it has fallen into vain now. And the Dharma meeting was established, and **** died.

The other is Yang Du, who is the prime minister of the new dynasty, who thinks that he is a new person who must be reused in the Yuan family, but Yuan Shikai chose old antiques and invited Xu Shichang and Xu Ge from the old museum, so that he just had a spring dream.

Originally, Yang Du was in the presidential palace, and Yuan Shikite designated Chun Yizhai as his lodging place, so that the two of them could talk at night with candles. Since Xu Shichang paid homage to the prime minister, Yang Du, who had been snubbed, would never enter the public mansion and "fold the willow chapter for himself".

In fact, Yuan Shikai's presidential system was implemented long ago before the promulgation of the law. Two years before the Republic of China, the official system of the Presidential Palace, in addition to the Secretariat Office, had the Office of Security and Promotion, the Military Department, the Foreign Affairs Office, the Finance Department, and the General Audit Office. Since the third year of the Republic of China, it has been changed to five halls of secretary, undertake, military, communication, and consultant and the guard office. The officials of various departments include the so-called "supervisors", "young eunuchs", "cheng", "lang", "sheren", and "senators". Some of them are honorary positions, and the monthly salary of consultants ranges from 800 yuan to several thousand yuan, and the monthly salary of consultants is 3,500 yuan.

Among those who are named in the presidential palace are the old bureaucrats of the Qing Dynasty, the officials who have left office in the Republic of China, and the fashionable politicians who have traveled from the north to the south. In the name of recruiting talents, Yuan thought that he could make the world's heroes into the world. These "talents" are accumulating more and more, and Yuan Shikai himself can't remember how many. At that time, the Beijing newspapers were extremely satirical about this, and the parliament also had a case: "Please submit the official system of the prefecture to the parliament for review."

The Covenant Council used "the Spring and Autumn Period to write the text of great unification, and Mencius set the precept of oneness" as an argument for the implementation of the presidential system, which is only "pretentious arguments".

Xu Shichang and Yuan Shikai are real old friends, if Yuan Shikai has a 100% trustworthy person in this life, this person must be Xu Shichang.

They were engaged in the era of cloth clothes, and after embarking on the eunuch journey, they quoted each other.

After Yuan Shikai took charge of the Beiyang Army, in order to avoid arousing the distraction of the Qing court, he allocated a part of the Beiyang Army to Xu Shichang to take outside the Guan, and Xu Shichang served as the governor of the three eastern provinces at that time. When Cixi died and Yuan Shikai was ordered to return to his hometown to "recuperate", Xu Shichang was equivalent to Yuan Shikai's agent in Beijing.

After the Xinhai Revolution, the Qing court used Yuan Shikai again, and in the final analysis, it was Xu Shichang who campaigned and instigated the Lord. Therefore, the personal relationship between Yuan Shikai and Xu Shichang is indeed incomparable to others.

However, since the Xinhai Revolution, Xu Shichang has regarded himself as a "widow", "shameful of eating Zhou Su", and has lived in Qingdao without asking about politics. On December 13 of the second year of the Republic of China, when Beijing held the "Feng'an" ceremony of Emperor Guangxu, he had quietly come to Beijing. He declared that the purpose of his visit to Beijing was to attend the Feng'an ceremony, and by the way, he congratulated his old friend on his inauguration as president of the Republic of China.

After Yuan became president, he awarded Xu Shichang a "meritorious one", but he refused to accept it and still returned to Qingdao.

It is said that when Yuan Shikai intended to invite Xu Shichang to Beijing, Yuan's "prince" Keding's persuasion was the most powerful. Yuan Keding didn't like Liang Shiyi very much, and some people suggested that Keding and invite Xu Shichang out was a good way to attack Liang. Yuan Keding tried his best to invite Xu Shichang out of the mountain, but Xu Shichang did not agree, but the two sides exchanged a lot of letters.

In February of the third year of the Republic of China, Yuan Shikite invited Xu Shichang's protégé Wang Yitang to make a special trip to Qingdao to promote driving, and brought a very sincere handwritten letter.

Xu Shichang was moved by the sincerity of his old friend, and on the one hand, he also felt that the authority of this old friend was becoming more and more prominent, so he "set off with his fate" and arrived in Beijing on 29 March.

Yuan Shikai appointed Xu Shichang as secretary of state, but Xu Shichang still refused to accept it.

Yuan Shikai sent Sun Baoqi and Duan Qirui to persuade them, but Xu Shichang still looked like an old man, and he didn't agree no matter how much he persuaded him.

made Duan Qirui a little angry, and said loudly: "Ju Lao (Xu Zi Juren) always refuses to go out of the mountain, don't you live up to the president's hard work, so how can we recover our lives?" ”

Xu Shichang changed his tone at this time, made a very painful expression and said: "Of course, I'm embarrassed not to help my old friend, okay, I'll come out for the transition for the time being." However, I will never accept the official salary of the Republic of China. ”

After Sun Baoqi and Duan Qirui returned to Yuan Shikai, Yuan Shikai was very happy and immediately vacated the conspicuous building where he worked and changed it into a political hall.

I moved to the same courtyard as the Spring Lotus Zhai office. Since the offices of the president and the secretary of state are in the same compound, Yuan Shikai often comes to chat with Xu Shichang.

Yuan Shikai had special respect for Xu Shichang, and he asked his subordinates to call Xu Shichang the old minister.

Xu Shichang had just been in office for a month, because he claimed that he was not subject to the official position of the Republic of China, but his old friend knew the temper of his old friend best, and Yuan instructed the Comptroller's Office to allocate 4,000 yuan to Xu under the president's social expenses. Because the money was taken out of an old friend's purse, Xu Shichang happily accepted it.