Although the mutiny initiated by Jiang Hao, the commander of Datong, was quickly quelled, this incident had a great impact on the local political ecology of Shanxi and the social situation of the whole country. Wild Sand Literature Network

First of all, for the local gentry in Shanxi, especially the gentry and landlords around the Datong area, this is a great blow. Because of their previous relationship with Jiang Jiu, coupled with their previous grievances for the Kang family, these gentry and landlords fell into the shadow of rebellion.

Although the Shanxi officials, who had always held a middle stance, did not think that the coinage bill issued by the imperial court was not a wrong policy, they still needed to continue to deal with these gentry and powerful in their own governance.

Especially in such a drought year, without the support of the local gentry, it is even more difficult for local officials to raise materials for disaster relief. What's more, in the face of such great opposition from the local gentry, it is still a question whether the imperial court can adhere to this bill.

Most officials did not want the court to regress from the gentry after they had carried out the policies of the court. Then they bother to do things, but in the end they are angry at both ends, why is this the reason? Therefore, for the sake of their own success, these officials are not very active in implementing the coinage bill, and just blindly wait and see.

When the Datong Mutiny broke out, these officials finally determined the direction of the imperial court, and also knew the imperial court's hardline attitude towards the implementation of the coinage law. Since this is the case, they will naturally not continue to do perfunctory things as before, so as to let the court target them.

And for those Shanxi gentry, in addition to confirming the tough attitude of the imperial court, they also clearly understood such a point. Behind the tough attitude shown by the imperial court, the imperial court still has enough power in its hands to deal with them.

After all, the Ming Dynasty is not the Han Dynasty and the Wei and Jin Dynasties, and the so-called local heroes are not the surnames of the gate lords after all. After the implementation of the imperial examination system for thousands of years, there are no more famous families in the local area who can monopolize the social resources of a place.

The famous families of the Han Dynasty, Wei and Jin dynasties were really capable of separating the local powers, so much so that the emperor required them to come out in order to consolidate the country's rule over the localities. Today's so-called famous families are completely proud of how many people and scholars there are in the family, and how many scholars and pavilion elders have been produced.

In other words, in the past, the famous families relied on their own strength, and even if the dynasty changed, it would not damage their local authority. However, today's famous families mainly rely on the power of the system, and if there is no one in a person's family who is an official, the family's local prestige will decline rapidly, and it may even fall into the ranks of the gentry.

Since the Tumubao Change, the original ruling pattern of the Ming Dynasty, in which the three powers of the emperor, the nobles, and the civil officials supported each other, was broken, and it became a situation in which the emperor and the civil officials relied on each other and competed for administrative power.

The emperors of the middle and late Ming Dynasty were not very interested in dealing with state affairs, which also made the cabinet, which was originally only drafted for the emperor, become the center of power to rule the Ming Dynasty, which means that the civilian group has almost held the highest power in the country.

From Jiajing, Wanli to the Apocalypse, the secret of these Ming emperors to maintain the power in their hands is nothing more than to use the inner court to contain the outer court, and to win over some civil officials to fight another part of the civil officials.

It is precisely because the administrative power of this country has been held by civilian officials that the gentry Qingliu dares to be a loyal minister who speaks out without scruples. Anyway, there are civil officials covering it, and the emperor can't execute himself. And after a few years in the local area, it is natural that someone will promote him according to his fame and let him return to the court.

While the gentry and bureaucracy colluded and controlled the power of the state, they had long forgotten that these powers did not fall from the sky, but what the Ming Dynasty gave to the bureaucrats and gentry when they ruled the country.

Once they lose the protection of the system, they can no longer use the power given by the system to resist the system. The demise of Jiang Xuan, the general soldier of Datong, undoubtedly taught them a profound lesson.

Even the chief military officer who holds military power in his hands is still very vulnerable in front of the power of the imperial court. Jiang Hao still ended up like this, how could they, the powerless scholars, resist a court that turned its face and didn't recognize people?

So the gentry and heroes who originally gathered around Jiang Jiu to slander the court are now spitting on the rebellious Jiang Jiu one by one, and they hate this person more than the other, praising the speed of the imperial court in sending troops to quell the chaos, trying to cut off Jiang Jiu with this behavior.

Almost overnight, the gentry in Shanxi became strong supporters of the coinage bill, and they took out their gold and silver and deposited them in the bank, even the gold and silver jewelry of their own daughters.

In order to show their loyalty, these gentry also kept informing the governor's palace and the governor's yamen, and reported what they believed to be hidden among the gentry.

For military officials like Wednesday, the behavior of these gentry was naturally worthy of encouragement. Because of their mutual reporting, Shanxi naturally settled down. Now these gentry families are wary of each other, and their previous distrust of the imperial court is even more serious. This also meant that for a short time the gentry and landlords in Shanxi could no longer unite against the imperial court.

But for the local civil officials in Shanxi, such a scene is obviously not something they are happy to see. Although because of the strong subordination of the gentry in these places, the materials they handed over have allowed Shanxi to survive this year's drought safely.

However, the incorruptibility and shamelessness of these gentry, coupled with the fact that the Governor's Office took the opportunity to meddle in local disaster relief matters, made the local civil officials in Shanxi feel ashamed and dissatisfied.

So soon after the Datong mutiny subsided, Song Xian, the governor of Shanxi, sent a letter to Ye Tinggui, the governor of Datong, asking him to write with him to impeach the Datong Governor's Office.

There are three contents of impeachment: first, ultra vires interference in local civil affairs; the second is that he knew that Jiang Liang, the chief soldier of Datong, had the intention of rebelling, but he connived at his rebellion and disturbed the place; The third is to use the mutiny to force the gentry to hand over money and grain, with the intention of seeking personal gain.

Regarding Song Xian's proposition, Ye Tinggui was still quite hesitant. Unlike the governor of Shanxi stationed in Taiyuan, the power of the governor of Datong can be described as pitiful. After all, there is the Governor's Mansion in Datong City in charge of the military, and there is the Governor of Fengda in Fengzhen, not far away, who is in charge of military and civil affairs.

Moreover, theoretically speaking, from Datong to Fengzhen, they all belong to the military area, and the power of the Governor's Mansion is much greater than that of his governor's yamen. If he easily agreed to study with Song Xian, he would undoubtedly push himself into an extremely embarrassing situation.

However, his adjutant Wei Jingyu persuaded him: "My lord, at the moment, it is not a matter of worrying about the conflict between the governor's yamen and the governor's mansion.

Although Lord Song's letter is biased, his position is good. After all, the gentry are still the foundation of the country, how can these military ministers be allowed to ravage wantonly?

Not to mention that he took the opportunity to meddle in local disaster relief affairs, just using our governor's yamen as a bait for the rebels in the process of changing the army, this is a bit of a shame.

If it weren't for the admiration of the people in the standard camp for their justice, they would resist with all their might. Haven't we been sold to these rebels? Even if the Governor's Mansion quells the mutiny afterwards, it will not be able to wash away the shame of being captured by the rebels..."

Wei Jingyu said a lot, but Ye Tinggui understood a little, it has nothing to do with right or wrong, but only about the position. Song Xian and the people around him hoped that he would be able to show that he was still on the side of the gentry.

The quelling of the Datong Mutiny this time did indeed cause a great shock to the local gentry in Shanxi, because they realized for the first time that the emperor had in his hands a force that could suppress the local area without going through the gentry.

This was obviously something that the gentry officials who regarded the New Army as the successor of the frontier army failed to think of, after all, when Yuan Chonghuan was in charge of the Fengda Governorate, the gentry did not see the New Army as a threat.

On the contrary, there were many who felt that the strong force of the Forces nouvelles would be beneficial to their business on the steppe. As long as they are in control of the Doge's Palace, they will be able to control the new army as they have in the past.

Wednesday's action finally exposed the false sense of security of these people. Let them realize that the power in the hands of the emperor seems to be beyond what they can accept.

If this kind of behavior is repeated a few times, won't the gentry really become the dogs of the Zhu family, and everyone will naturally find it difficult to accept. Therefore, while actively responding to the call of the imperial court, they tried to begin to restrain the power in the hands of the emperor, especially the emperor's influence on the army.

In the end, Ye Tinggui was unable to refuse Song Xian's request, so Wei Jingyu drafted a draft for himself, and then wrote a letter with Song Xian to impeach the Datong Governor's Office.

When Ye Tinggui and Song Xian's letters were sent to Chongzhen, the time had already entered June. Under the urging of the emperor, Tian Yang was finally able to connect three optical telegraphs from Xi'an, Wuhan, and Nanjing to Beijing by June, which greatly improved the imperial court's grasp of the local situation and accelerated the process of cabinet decision-making.

June was supposed to be the beginning of the summer harvest, but because of such a year, it became the beginning of turmoil in various parts of the Ming Dynasty. Shaanxi, Henan, and Shandong have all seen displaced people and small-scale unrest, and even rice grabbing incidents have occurred around Nanjing.

According to the statistics of the Disaster Relief Committee, this year, a total of 171 prefectures and counties were affected by the disaster, including 75 prefectures and counties, 68 prefectures and counties with moderate disasters, and 28 prefectures and counties.

What made Chongzhen irritable was that after a long period of drought and no rain in the Sanwu area, on May 13, Wujiang and Gui'an in the Su, Song, and Hu areas suddenly poured rain day and night. Due to the sudden burst of water, the water level in the river swelled suddenly, causing some embankments and riverside houses to topple.

Although the imperial court carried out water conservancy construction in the area around Taihu Lake in the past few years, and also cleaned up a number of paddy fields that encroached on the lake and rivers, the flood still caused great financial losses to the local people.

Coupled with the previous drought, the price of rice soared, and the price of rice rose to two or three triangles, while the local rice price in the same period last year was only less than seven jiao. Of course, what Zhu Youjian didn't know was that in another historical track, the price of rice had risen 10 times that of last year, which led to the Sanwu famine.

At this time, the local people just feel that life is sad, and there is no scene where they can't survive.