After the Jiangnan Rebellion, the resistance forces in Jiangnan disappeared, and most of the forces against the new court in Jiaqing also died down. The only local governor in the pen ~ fun ~ pavilion www.biquge.info who was still on his own, the governor of Shaanxi and Gansu, Leerjin, was also coerced by the Wuwei army who advanced to Shaanxi after the pacification of the mixed Yuan Sect, and finally accepted the assignment of the imperial court and returned to the capital to serve in the imperial court.

However, Leerjin's fate was not good, and not long after he returned to Beijing, the Metropolitan Procuratorate initiated an investigation against him. The Gansu Fraud Case broke out.

This corruption case began as early as the 39th year of Qianlong (1774), and the Qing Dynasty had implemented "donation of prisons" in Gansu. The so-called "donation to prison" means that all students who are willing to obtain the academic qualifications of Guozi Prison Supervisor must donate grain to the local government warehouse in a prescribed amount, and use this grain to help the victims in the event of a famine. Later, the "donation to prison" was stopped for a time. After Wang Kanwang was appointed as the political envoy of Gansu, he persuaded the governor of Shaanxi and Gansu, Leerjin, to ask the Qing court for permission on the grounds that Gansu's storage was insufficient and he could "donate" grain and rice to the victims. In the 39th year of Qianlong, he began to donate money in various parts of Gansu.

However, this time the donation, Wang Kangwang privately changed the "original order to only accept grain and rice in natural color" to "privately collect silver taels". In this way, the grain and rice donated to the prison became silver, and it was obviously easier and more convenient to operate money and silver than rice and grain. When the Qing court approved the resumption of prison donations, it stipulated that each prisoner should donate 43 taels of grain, and Wang Kangwang converted the 43 stones of grain into 47 taels of silver, and added 8 taels of office silver and miscellaneous silver, totaling 55 taels of silver for each prisoner. In this way, the overseer suddenly turned into white silver.

At the same time, Wang Kangwang transferred Jiang Quandi as the prefect of Lanzhou to undertake this matter. Jiang Quandi acted completely in accordance with Wang Kangwang's intentions, and spent the privately collected silver arbitrarily in the name of disaster relief to make a profit. Jiang Quandi consulted with Wang Kangwang to plan for the counties the disaster situation that did not exist. According to the severity of the disaster report of each county, the amount of donations to be collected is determined, and the yamen of the feudal division predetermined the number of copies to send a bill to each county, so that each county can open the relief according to the order, which is called "fake relief".

The two of them also discussed the establishment of a method of "sitting on the provincial governor's entourage" and sat in Lanzhou. Receiving stolen money. All counties that gave Wang Kangwang a silver tael as disaster relief were sent in according to the method of "sitting on the governor of the province". Jiang Quandi also took the opportunity to extort and send money to various places. Later, after Wang Tingzan took over as the political envoy of Gansu, although he found that the grain and silver in prison did not meet the regulations of "donating to prisons", he also discussed with the governor and wanted to ask for a stop to donate, but after all, he could not withstand the temptation of interests. Intensify and return to the quagmire.

From April of the 39th year of Qianlong to the beginning of the 42nd year alone, in less than three years, more than 600,000 stones of grain were spent. And the grain that was sold was actually converted into silver and fell into the hands of corrupt officials.

At that time, as the mastermind and main determinator of the case of fraudulent relief, Wang Kangwang had a rule for accepting money, that is, his subordinates could not let him see the money they sent. And the bribe-giver put the money in jars of wine and in baskets and other vessels. Or through the janitor, Wang Kanwang and his subordinates naturally knew it. For the sake of greed. State officials also played a disgraceful role, with some directly involved in the distribution of spoils, some accepting bribes, and some reporting false information to cover up their subordinates. At that time, there was such a saying in Gansu officialdom: "One thousand taels to meet, two thousand taels to eat." Three thousand taels of arrows. ”

It can be said that no one in Gansu officialdom is not greedy, and no one is dirty.

On the other hand, this matter is because there was an uprising in Gansu and the imperial court sent troops to suppress it, so I learned that there was no disaster in Gansu in recent years. Le Erjin, Wang Kangwang and other talents were arrested. In this plane, the Tang people naturally grasped the detailed situation and secretly provided information to the Metropolitan Procuratorate.

Even, in the team sent by the imperial court to Gansu to recover stolen goods, there are also a large number of Tang agents and accountants. Because the Tang people were more ruthless than the Qing officials, the other Qing court only recovered more than 2 million taels, and this time he even chased the stolen goods and quarreled, and directly got 6 million taels.

The so-called meeting was divided into half, and the Tang people directly spent three million taels of this money. And the officials of the Metropolitan Procuratorate did not dare to beak at all, because the guns were in the hands of others, and even the amount reported to Jiaqing was only more than three million taels.

But this is enough for Jiaqing to be angry, he has long known that the corruption in the officialdom of the Qianlong Dynasty is serious, but the successive Cathay Pacific cases and the Gansu fraud case have shocked Jiaqing. The country doesn't know how much money is going into pockets that shouldn't be.

When the Tang people invaded the city of Beijing, they quarreled with all the Manchurians in the capital and the Han officials, and some of them looked honest and honest, and their family assets were millions of taels. Jiaqing couldn't grasp the exact number, but he knew that it took Tang people a week to transport these belongings.

Jiaqing, under the tight financial situation of the imperial court, finally paid attention to the officials. The Metropolitan Procuratorate began to investigate the integrity of officials on a large scale, and even the Tang people provided a lot of information. Once the problem was found out, the house was raided and the stolen goods were recovered, and all of a sudden, Jiaqing turned the officialdom upside down, and just the house was copied out, as much as 7 million taels of silver. It can also be regarded as alleviating the urgent need of the imperial court's finances.

Most of these officials who were investigated and punished were local officials, all of whom were Manchu and Han. The main reason is that the capital has been looted by the Tang people last year, and there is no oil and water to be fished out.

However, after the establishment of the new imperial court, the officials who began to sell their official titles on a large scale, and the donors who paid a lot of money all hoped to recover their costs by corruption, but when Jiaqing came, even some officials were immediately raided before their chairs were hot. Not only did he not earn anything, but he was also imprisoned, and even his family property was lost.

This naturally led to the frustration of people's enthusiasm for donating officials later, and the income of the imperial court donors was greatly reduced, but Jiaqing took more money from his family.

In addition, what was a surprise to the Qing court was that although the new bureaucratic system adopted under the pressure of the Tang people increased the number of officials several times, the overall expenditure did not change much. Administrative efficiency has increased considerably.

From a small official to an official, the group has a relatively high enthusiasm for work. Under the new system, there is less money that can be manipulated. This affects the income of officials, but it cannot be said to be unreasonable. The expenses of official affairs were borne by the imperial court, and the maintenance of incorruptible silver was abolished, which made every penny of the imperial court have a record of discrepancies.

Although there was resistance at first, Jiaqing and many officials recognized the superiority of the system. For Datang, helping the Qing State change the system is not for the sake of kindness. In fact, it is to be able to shear the sheep more conveniently, and when I receive it later, there are more troubles. (To be continued.) )