readx; No matter what kind of reform it is, fundamentally speaking, it is to adjust the old division of responsibilities and interests and interests, and this involves specific people, so reform is first of all to "change people". For Zhu Youzhen www.biquge.info this is the problem he is facing: he needs to immediately appoint new local officials in Henan Province and Kaifeng Prefecture.

After ascending the throne, Zhu Youzhen once learned in great detail about the local administrative system of the dynasty from those knowledgeable ministers in the "Daily Lecture". The local administrative regions of the Ming Dynasty were divided into three levels, namely provinces, prefectures (prefectures), and counties. Among them, the "province" is derived from the "province" system of the Yuan Dynasty, and the official name is "Chengxuan Political Envoy Division", but it is still customary to call it "province". The whole country includes two capitals and thirteen envoys, and Henan is one of the provinces.

According to the "ancestral system" set in the Hongwu period, the highest chief executive at the provincial level is called "Bu Political Envoy", commonly known as "Fantai", and has the power to announce government decrees, manage subordinate officials, and control financial endowments. Parallel to this is the highest official in charge of criminal litigation in a province, "according to the inspection envoy", commonly known as "Zhentai", who was also a civil official of the second grade. In addition, the "Metropolitan Commanders", the highest military commanders of the provincial-level health institutions "Metropolitan Divisions", collectively known as the "Three Divisions", are in charge of the administrative, judicial, and military powers of a province, thus avoiding excessive concentration of power, and at least playing a positive role in the establishment of the system.

However, as peace lasts for a long time, local government institutions inevitably breed*, inefficiency, overstaffing, and even turmoil, affecting the security of the entire empire. Under such circumstances, the imperial court had to send an official from the central government to deal with some matters that the "three divisions" had been arguing with each other for a long time, or that could not be solved at all by their ability, and the official position of this official was called "governor".

At the beginning, the governor was only temporarily dispatched, and after the problem was solved, he still returned to the imperial court, and his official qualities were not necessarily better than those of political envoys and envoys. Later, there were more and more local problems, especially in the military and defense affairs, and the governor gradually changed from temporary to statute, and finally became the supreme military and judicial governor of a province. Correspondingly, the official qualities of the governor are generally the second grade, while the official qualities of the political envoy and the probationary envoy are downgraded to the third rank and become the subordinate officials of the governor.

According to Zhu Youzhen's understanding, if we take the names of officials in the previous life, the governor is roughly equivalent to the secretary of the provincial party committee, the political envoy is equivalent to the provincial governor, the procurator is equivalent to the president of the provincial court and the chief procurator of the procuratorate, and the commander is equivalent to the commander of the military division. With so many departments in charge, the power of one governor is quite large. In fact, it is not so much, take the governor of Henan as an example, the full title of the official position is "the governor of Henan and other places, the governor of military affairs, the salary and the management of the river, the right attendant of the military department, and the right deputy of the military department, and the imperial history of the right deputy of the Metropolitan Procuratorate", just reading it out is already very scary.

However, whether it is a governor, a political envoy, an envoy or a commander, they are all high-ranking officials. It is the government and county officials, especially the county officials, who really deal with ordinary people. Zhu Youzhen knew this in Jingyang County, the characteristics of the county-level government in the Ming Dynasty were that there were officials and officials, and there were few officials and many officials; Nominally, the official is greater than the official, but in fact the official "kidnaps" the official.

Specifically, there are only five "court officials" in a county: Zhixian and Zhengqipin; County Cheng, is eight products; The main book, is the ninth product; Classical history is not as streamed; The teachings are not as streaming.

But it is obvious that it is impossible for a county to be governed by only five people, so there are officials below the officials, that is, other people in the yamen. According to the original concept when this system was designed, officials also belonged to the people, were not included in the official establishment of the imperial court, and did not pay salaries, and working for the yamen was equivalent to serving as conscription.

However, because the officials were in direct contact with the people, all kinds of decrees and laws of the imperial court had to be implemented by their hands, and they were all held by locals, and they were often passed down from father to son; The county magistrate is changed every few years, and he is often transferred away before he has a thorough understanding of the situation in the county. So as time passed, the officials grasped the real power of a county, and the magistrate was just a "big man" who was offered. In the end, in addition to the county magistrate, the county officials, the chief bookkeeper and other low-level officials also gradually became "officials", and they often colluded with the local wealthy to prey on the common people, and did all kinds of things that deceived the superiors and subordinates, hurt the heavens and reason, and smelled unpleasant, and the court was kept in the dark.

What Zhu Youzhen really wants to reform is precisely the county government, which is the most basic level of government. However, he had to start from top to bottom, first appointing provincial-level officials such as the governor of Henan, the political envoy, and the envoy. According to the rules, local officials at the provincial level are recommended by the cabinet, and this time was no exception, and the cabinet recommended three people to the emperor, namely Fan Jingwen, Xuan Mo and Wang Jiazhen.

Zhu Youzhen carefully studied the resumes of these three people. Their original official positions were Shaoqing of Taichang Temple, the right deputy of the Imperial Court of the Imperial Palace, and the right servant of the household department, all of whom were civil officials of the third grade. The cabinet recommended Wang Jiazhen as the governor of Henan, Fan Jingwen as the political envoy of Henan, and Xuan Mo as the envoy of Henan, on the grounds that the three of them were of the same grade, and Wang Jiazhen was the earliest, Fan Jingwen was second, and Xuan Mo was second.

After further research, Zhu Youzhen found a very interesting phenomenon: these three people are not Donglin officials. After a little thought, he understood: the Donglin Party believed that Beijing officials were more likely to influence the government than local officials, and that speech officials had more say than actual officials. Moreover, Henan has just experienced a military disaster, and at this time he must face a mess when he takes office, not only can he not make political achievements in the short term, but he will also stab Lou Zi if he does not do it well, which will seriously affect his career, so he only recommends non-Donglin officials, so as to exclude dissidents, and the means cannot be described as "clever".

However, this made Zhu Youzhen interested, and wanted to see why these three people did not recruit the Donglin Party to be treated. It doesn't matter if you look at this, Zhu Youzhen was overjoyed: they are the people he wants to use!

Let's talk about Wang Jiazhen first, he once served as the governor of Gansu and has rich experience in local politics. At that time, adjacent to Gansu, the Qinghai Mongolian tribe Songshan chieftain Yinding, gangsters repeatedly committed the border, the local border army feared the enemy like a tiger, Wang Jiazhen was a scholar, but he was able to carry a knife on the horse and take the lead, and designed three victories in silver, gangster, beheading more than 500 levels, very courageous.

Let's talk about Xuan Mo, who has an upright temperament and an iron face and is selfless. In the first appointment of officials, and later to the official department, countless cases have been tried, and the officials participating in the impeachment can also clearly observe their mistakes.

What Zhu Youzhen values the most is Fan Jingwen. He also started his career as a promoter, and successively served as a member of the Ministry of Literature and Selection. When Wei Zhongxian's power was monstrous and he wantonly appointed traitorous villains, Fan Jingwen asked the imperial court to open up the road to make him famous all over the world. Among them, there are a few sentences: "Heaven and earth talents, should be cherished for heaven and earth." The famous instrument of the imperial court should be guarded by the imperial court. The world is right and wrong, and it should be shared with heaven and earth for all ages! ”

Zhu Youzhen applauded the strike festival, and made a decision in an instant: let Fan Jingwen be the governor of Henan!