The specific comparative analysis is a little more rigorous than this. The Taxation Department under the Ministry of Internal Affairs also has control over the commercial tax collection of each county, and it is easy to judge through the commercial tax on the decline in production and the increase in the number of counties in those counties.

You can also compare different regions but with similar levels of economic development, such as Panyu County in Guangzhou and Nantong County in Jiangsu, and Heze County in Shandong and Wuchang County in Hubei.

In contrast to this kind of vertical and horizontal, cross-regional, cross-regional, cross-time, and cross-space systems, it is simply clear that there are problems with those accounts.

After determining that there was a problem in these counties, they sent people to visit them secretly to obtain first-hand information on how much tax collectors deducted from the time the peasants paid their taxes, and how much benefits the merchants had to give when they went to the government to do business. Since these counties dare to do their tricks in the tax accounts, there must be other corrupt projects, which will be made public at once after they have been investigated one by one and have the most detailed information.

Without going through the cabinet or the six ministries, it was directly published in the official newspaper of the Great Zhou.

The aim is to undermine the prestige of traditional governments.

When the common people looked at it, wow, it turned out that there were so many corrupt officials, and the people did not expect it, because at present, the official reputation of the entire bureaucratic system is still good, and the people's evaluation feels that it is a peaceful and prosperous era, but it is a prosperous era, and there are many corrupt officials.

There are many magistrates who have very few official voices, and they even appeared in the official registration list, which shocked many people, it turned out that Zhang Qingtian was a corrupt official? ! I thought he was a good ruler who ruled for the people.

Zhou Lang's political offensive really caught Wang Fuqian off guard.

He knew that Zhou Lang was checking the accounts, and when the Ministry of Internal Affairs went to the household department to transfer the money and grain account books of the prefecture and county over the years, the household department Shangshu told him.

At that time, the two of them didn't care, because they had also checked these account books, and they couldn't see any problems when they took them out individually.

But a fake account is a fake account, unless the county officials all over the world come together to do this account, otherwise they will be flat, and the comparison with other counties will be uneven, tens of thousands of counties across the country, at most neighboring states and counties can communicate secretly, and it is impossible to do it across governments and provinces.

The emperor's actions made Wang Fuqian feel very ashamed, he had just pressed the emperor with the style of a scholar, and let the emperor turn over the old accounts, of course, corruption was not the backbone of a scholar, and he was extremely angry. Immediately let the household department Shangshu check it, and if the emperor can find out, they can also check it.

Self-examination, rejuvenating the prison, Wang Fuqian is actually more ruthless to the bureaucratic system than Zhou Lang.

He has actually done a good job over the years, and he attaches great importance to official style and discipline, and it is basically impossible for an official like Chen Huai who has a poor reputation in the local government and can be promoted step by step. The appointment, dismissal, and promotion of any official must be investigated by the official reputation. It is impossible for a person who does not have a good official reputation in the local area to be promoted.

The traditional system, if strictly enforced, can still be very effective, but what has been used for thousands of years, of course, cannot be perfect, so there are a lot of loopholes to exploit, and it cannot be eliminated by top-down pressure, unless it is changed from the source, but the bureaucracy admires the Chinese system too much and refuses to change anything.

The account books of the 300 counties transferred by the Internal Affairs Office were checked by Wang Fuqian's supervision of the six departments, and no problems were found.

He wondered how the emperor found out.

Wang Fuqian believed that the emperor would never be untargeted, and he wondered if the emperor had used his intelligence ability to secretly investigate. So he immediately asked to see with the head of the household, and they wanted to express their stance on this matter, and they were in favor of investigating corruption. And I hope that they will check themselves first. And Wang Fuqian also plans to borrow the power of collecting wind to conduct an inventory of hundreds of officials.

As a result, when they arrived at the kilometer, Zhou Lang told them that it was just some simple accounts, where they needed to use the wind collection.

Zhou Lang checked it himself, put out the account books, and told them how to compare statistics and find information from the data, dead data will not deceive people.

With a set of big data management, Wang Fuqian and the household department were stunned, the local account books must be compiled according to the standards of the household department, everyone knows that the household department audits that set of methods, naturally it is impossible to find out the methods of the user department, only through other methods, such as modern accounting methods.

After explaining to them, Zhou Lang said earnestly: "The household department has a great relationship, how can there be such a mistake." ”

Wang Fuqian asked the accountant of the Taxation Department to conduct a census of the money and grain account books of the prefectures and counties across the country, and he wanted to find out all the black sheep.

Zhou Lang sighed: "It's not up to the corrupt officer to solve the problem. The solution is to eradicate corruption at its roots. If you don't give corrupt personnel a loophole, how can there be a difference between good and bad people, wealth is moving, and a good person will inevitably make mistakes after staying in the household department for a long time. Strict management of procedures is for the protection of people. Which corrupt officer is not a talent? Killing either one is heart-wrenching. ”

Wang Fuqian insisted on investigating, so Zhou Lang asked the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Department of Taxation to fully cooperate, and after the investigation, it was found that one-third of the country's accounts were problematic. If a third of the people dare to manipulate the accounts, then I am afraid that there will be even more such things as deducting and blackmailing, and if you look closely, I am afraid that the entire bureaucratic system will have problems.

At this time, Wang Fuqian had nothing to say, he was hit hard, he worked so hard, but he reaped such a result.

Is the doctor really hopeless? If you read the books of sages one by one, can't you be a gentleman?

At this time, Zhou Lang said to Wang Fuqian: "This is human nature. The hustle and bustle of the world is all for fame, and the hustle and bustle of the world is for profit, how many people can do it without being moved by fame and fortune? Some people want to be famous, some people want profits, you and I are not exempt from vulgarity, let alone others? ”

Wang Fuqian felt guilty in his heart, he did feel that he was forced to the palace, and he was indeed a little burdened by fame.

It is not the work of a man to persecute the lord with a minister.

When Wang Fuqian was down, he immediately kowtowed: "Weichen is guilty!" ”

Zhou Lang shouted: "Get up, what do you look like." ”

Zhou Lang did not directly propose reform, but asked Wang Fuqian to go back to rectify first.

After that, he sent inspectors to the household department to regularly inspect the accounts of the household department and make public announcements to the world through official newspapers.

After this toss, the household department was discredited.

Soon when the court meeting was held, someone immediately impeached the household department for dereliction of duty, Zhou Lang symbolically punished it, and then some people proposed that the household accounting business was not proficient, because most of them were useless, and required that the household department should be assessed before the businessman, which was a disguised reform of the imperial examination, and it was of course the imperial election faction that proposed this proposal.

Zhou Lang also vetoed it, and affirmed the role of the imperial examination in selecting talents and abilities against his will, but added a clause that the household department should study accounting before taking up his post, and he would send him to school to study.

This is tantamount to allowing those civil officials who were born in the imperial examination to enter the school that trains the imperial election officials to study and increase their professional knowledge. Since then, the household department has also been infiltrated by the imperial election system.

Regarding Zhou Lang's dispatch of inspection officials and the training of household personnel, Wang Fuqian had no objection.

Zhou Lang stopped at the end of the day, and did not take the next step, because these were all things during the war, and he did not carry out drastic reforms for the sake of the overall situation.

So far, Zhou Lang has absolute control over the Ministry of Industry in the six ministries, and has completed indirect control over the Ministry of Households. Half of the Ministry of Rites was reformed, and the imperial examination could not be moved, but diplomacy could only be reformed, and all the diplomatic functions of the Ministry of Rites were merged into the Imperial Court. The emperor has always been in charge of the ministry at the highest level, so he can be regarded as controlling one-third of the power.

The only thing Zhou Lang didn't move was the Criminal Department, although this department was very important, he couldn't find a good entry point. Although the judicial system is traditional, people are also traditional, and the common people have become accustomed to this set of judicial procedures.

There is no internal impetus for reform, but there is a strong external momentum.

With the opening up of the country and the expansion of trade, there are more foreigners, and foreigners are very dissatisfied with China's judicial system, and they always feel that they have been treated unfairly. If a foreigner has a conflict with the Chinese people, he will be arrested and beaten at every turn, and there are indeed cases where the punishment of foreigners is heavier, just as the Manchu officials in Yunnan and other places tend to favor the Han people who are more local in their politics, and the local officials are also more partial to the people in dealing with judicial disputes between foreigners and the Chinese people. This is already a tradition, this is the case in the former Qing Dynasty, Guangzhou was a port of trade, accidentally injured or even killed, in the Qing Dynasty in fact, there will not be a death penalty, but if a foreigner kills someone, no matter how he died, he will put forward a request for the foreigner to pay for his life.

As for playing the board, it is even more commonplace, since the Ming Dynasty, the Portuguese in Macao have clashed with the Chinese people, and the county magistrate of Xiangshan County will directly arrest the Portuguese governor if he can't find the murderer, and beat the board. At that time, the Portuguese governor always had an arrogant attitude in front of Westerners, trying his best to package himself as the Portuguese governor of China, and after taking the board, he secretly went back to continue to put on the score, anyway, the Westerners did not know.

These judicial procedures are very frightening to foreigners, and they are unable to hire a lawyer to defend them, and local lawyers who dare to help foreigners fight lawsuits will cause trouble, so foreigners have protested many times, hoping to seek consular jurisdiction (extraterritoriality), but this time is not the end of the Qing Dynasty, and this kind of infringement of the judicial power of their own country is unacceptable.

Reform is also very difficult, and if Zhou Lang uses the protest of foreigners as a reason to carry out reform, I am afraid it will backfire.

Just as the United States will not change its own system because of the criticism of the North Koreans, Chinese officials at this time, and even ordinary people, are extremely proud of their country, telling the people that no one will accept how humane the judicial process of foreigners is and how strict the judicial system of foreigners is.

This is the biggest problem encountered by Zhou Lang, a reformer: the lack of internal motivation for reform!

Moreover, the deeper this dilemma goes, the better the country develops, the more there is no reason for reform.