Weng Tongyi knocked lightly on the door of the imperial study, and there was no sound from inside for a while, he turned around and nodded at Li Hongzhang, signaling the other party to wait a while. Pen ~ fun ~ Pavilion www.biquge.info After serving as the prime minister of the Kazakh Khanate and the Xihua Kingdom for many years, Li Hongzhang finally waited for the opportunity to be promoted. Luo Zenan, the right minister of the cabinet, resigned a month ago to participate in the election in Hunan Province -- a province that should theoretically be the foundation of the Donglin Party, and there are some signs of urgency in the upcoming general election in the 18th year of the liberation.

This was actually caused by the continued low grain prices, and the dissatisfaction of the landlord class in Hunan with the ruling Donglin Party, which gave the Jishi Youth Party the opportunity to seize power in Hunan. At the same time, the votes of the industrial and commercial capitalists in several provinces have been very stable because of the good state of economic development, and the Donglin Party has no chance at all...... If the Donglin Party loses the four agricultural provinces of Hunan, Hubei, Anhui, and Jiangxi in this election, then it will probably be impossible for Zhu Jishi to let the Jishi Youth Party come to power so soon.

In addition, the general election in the 18th year of liberation is not limited to the eight provinces south of the Yangtze River and the two northwestern provinces of Borneo. The parliaments of 30 provinces, including the 18 provinces of Han China, the three provinces of Northeast China, the province of Beijiaozhou, the five provinces of Borneo, and the three provinces of Monan, as well as the parliaments of Yingtianfu, must all be re-elected! In addition, the number of seats represented by the provinces in the lower house of the Central Constituent Assembly will be adjusted, taking into account not only taxation but also population, and the proportion of the former wealth-rich land will be reduced, a rule change that will benefit the Donglin Party.

So this general election is basically a big showdown between the Donglin Party and the Jishi Youth Party.

Zuo Zongtang, Luo Zenan, Xu Gengshen, Weng Tongshu, and Li Hongzao, the leaders of the Donglin Party, have already made calculations. In places where Tianfu, Shuntianfu, Nanzhili, Zhejiang, Guangdong, Fujian, Borneo, Beizhili and Liaoning Province are developed in industry and commerce, or where there are too many new-style universities (Shuntianfu), the Donglin Party will lose. That is, these eleven provinces plus two directly governed provinces must have won the Jishi Youth Party.

The four provinces of Jilin, Heilongjiang, Beijiaozhou and Gansu are not very developed in industry and commerce, but there is almost no gentry power. No one is sure what it will be. The goal of the Donglin Party is to take two of these provinces. In the remaining fifteen provinces, it stands to reason that the power of the gentry is greater than that of the merchants, and it should be the Donglin Party that wins. However, the investigations made by several major newspapers such as "Ta Kung Pao", "Shilin Daily", and "Qingliu Daily" at the beginning of the 18th year of Guangfu made Zuo Zongtang and others break out in a cold sweat. Not only did the Donglin Party lag behind in 15 non-gentry provinces and 2 provinces directly under the central government. Moreover, the support rate among the 15 "gentry provinces" is not very good, 7 of which are lower than the support of the Jishi Youth Party, and the remaining 8 provinces are only slightly ahead. Moreover, among the seven provinces with a low support rate of the Donglin Party, Hunan, Hubei, Anhui, and Jiangxi are also included in the four "gentry provinces".

In the urgency of the election, Zuo Zongtang and Luo Zenan had to try to "put out the fire". The first is to win over the Anhui gentry and give the right minister's seat to Li Hongzhang in exchange for the full support of the Li family and the Miao family. Secondly, he sent Luo Zenan, a general from Xianghu, to Hunan to serve as the governor of Hunan, in an effort to save Hunan's election situation. Once again, Ye Mingchen, who had retired, was sent out of the mountain to serve as the governor of Hubei, trying to use his appeal to stabilize the ground in Hubei. Finally, I asked for leave to go to Jiangxi for the auxiliary election. In any case, we must stabilize the territory of these four provinces!

And Emperor Zhu is also on the road, and he agreed to the series of personnel adjustments proposed by Zuo Zongtang one by one. In fact, he was quite satisfied with the performance of the cabinets of Zuo Zongtang and Luo Zenan over the years, and he was also very surprised that the public support rate of the Donglin Party was so low. Although he himself does not like the Donglin gentlemen, the Donglin Party is the de facto ruling party, and it is Emperor Zhu himself who really holds the power. Isn't the public opinion not supporting the Donglin Party now dissatisfied with Zhu Jishi's administration?

At this time, Zhu Jishi's voice sounded inside the door: "Come in!" Li Hongzhang straightened his black gauze hat at the door and walked in solemnly. He, the right minister, has just come to power, and he has been exiled to Kazakhstan before, and he doesn't know that our Emperor Zhu doesn't pay much attention to etiquette. He entered the door, and just as he wanted to kneel, he was interrupted by Zhu Jishi waving his hand: "No need to salute, Li Qing, sit down, sit down and talk." As he spoke, he beckoned the maid who was waiting in the study and moved a chair for Li Hongzhang and Weng Tongyi.

"How? Is the Donglin Party's election situation better? Zhu Jishi's first question also surprised Li Hongzhang. In the past two days, Zuo Zongtang has been in contact with the landlords and rich peasants in various parts of Jiangxi, and the affairs of the cabinet are all managed by Li Hongzhang. He came to the Hot Spring Palace to report to Zhu Jishi about government affairs, but he didn't expect the emperor to ask about the election.

"If you go back to the emperor, the situation is not very good." Li Hongzhang frowned and said with a wry smile, "In the past few years, the farmers in Han have always worked very hard, and the grain is cheap and hurts the farmers!" Even the landlord and squire were not happy. There are many people who have proposed that Han land should follow the example of North Korea and implement agricultural protection......"

The agricultural protection of the Joseon Kingdom began in the 12th year of the liberation, mainly due to the impact of low-cost grain in the northeast on the Korean domestic market, which the small farmers of the Joseon could not bear, and a large number of bankruptcies and non-payment of taxes were carried out. In desperation, the DPRK parliamentary government could only ask for temporary protection of agriculture. Emperor Zhu granted them a 10-year period of protection. Let North Korean agriculture temporarily withdraw from the Greater China market. Unexpectedly, now the Han landlords also want to engage in protection.

"It's not going to work." Zhu Jishi shook his head slightly, and said with a faint smile, "If the agricultural products of the Han region are to be protected, the border provinces will not have much money to buy the industrial products of the Han region." Nanzhi, Zhejiang, Fujian and Guangdong provinces agreed? ”

It's really a trade cycle. The industrial and commercial towns of Han China exchanged industrial products for agricultural products and other raw materials from the border provinces. The Han Province of Agriculture, which had been supplying agricultural products to the Han Industrial and Commercial Center, suffered losses due to the crowding out of the market. Strictly speaking, it is similar to the situation before the American Civil War. If Zhu Jishi agrees to implement the protection of agricultural products in the Han region, it will make the Han agricultural province feel better. However, it will make the industrial and commercial areas of the Han region pay the cost. Worse still, such a policy could lead to the fragmentation of the Greater China Customs Union – if it is short-lived. But if it is maintained for several decades, I am afraid that the consequence is that the Ming Empire will lose its unified economic base! According to Zhu Jishi's vision, the future Ming Empire, or the larger Great China Empire, should have a unified economic foundation.

And the policy of protecting Han agriculture can help Han agriculture to be strong enough to withstand the impact of border agriculture? This is obviously a fool's dream! At present, the cultivated land area of the border land of the Ming Dynasty has exceeded that of the Han land, and there are still a large number of grasslands, mountains and forests that can be used and undeveloped. Such an advantage is simply not something that the current small-scale peasant economy in Han can resist. The only way to do this is to adjust the structure of Han agriculture – a similar idea was proposed by Zhu Jishi as early as last year. Use state funds to help Han agriculture adjust and form economies of scale, while accelerating the pace of urbanization and emigration.

Li Hongzhang also knew that Emperor Zhu would not allow the implementation of agricultural protection policies in the Han region, so he just shook his head with a wry smile: "Then this election is really a bit dangerous, and it would be good to be able to keep 10 provinces." ”

Zhu Jishi thought for a while, nodded and said, "It doesn't matter, I will continue to let Zuo Zongtang form a cabinet with you, my Ming Dynasty is not a constitutional country." ”

Parliamentary minorities formed cabinets were also common in Europe in this era. When Bismarck, the iron-blooded prime minister, came to power, the entire parliament was controlled by liberals, and no one supported him at all.

Li Hongzhang nodded and said: "The emperor is gracious, and the ministers and the left minister can only do their best to repay one or two." He paused, and then said, "It's just that the Han farmers have suffered...... Chen is also from a rural background, although he has never farmed, he also knows that farming is not easy. Facing the loess with its back to the sky, there are few idle days throughout the year, and it takes God's help to have a bumper harvest. Now I can't sell much silver, and after paying the rent and tax, I don't have much left, and I can't even eat and wear, which is really sad. ”r1152