There is a quiet courtyard not far from the Metropolitan Governor's Mansion in Nanjing, and there are two men in short coats sitting at the gate of the courtyard, which looks like the nursing home of a large family, both of them are staring at the pedestrians outside, their eyes are extremely sharp, and it does not seem to be just a nursing home.

The yard is not big, but there are many houses. In the innermost row of the right room, there was a person sitting in front of the window, staring at the paper in his hand, carefully looking, and when he got closer, this person was Lai Fu.

When the soldiers and civilians of Yangzhou resisted the attack of Aobai, Lai Fu was imprisoned, and later moved from Yangzhou to Nanjing, although he had heard of some, but Lai Fu did not know how much damage his actions caused to the soldiers and civilians of Yangzhou.

After Luo Jian talked to Lai Fu in the prison of the Criminal Department, Lai Fu knew that because he did not report his secret information, he caused the sacrifice of 20,000 or 30,000 soldiers and civilians in Yangzhou and Nanjing, and Lai Fu, who had obtained the specific number of losses, knelt in front of Luo Jian for more than an hour.

When Luo Jian sent someone to pick him up in the prison of the Criminal Department the next day, Lai Fu was still kneeling in the cell in the direction of Yangzhou, and it was the servants who dragged him up from the ground.

After taking Lai Fu out, Luo Jian and Liu Lan talked with him for a long time, and Lai Fu understood all the thoughts of the Metropolitan Governor and his wife, that is, to do something for the country, the nation, and the common people wholeheartedly, and they were not interested in the so-called throne at all.

What Mr. Liu Zongzhou said to Luo Jian before he died made Luo Jian have a lot of worries. It seems that it is only a matter of time before the Manchus are driven out or even wiped out entirely. If something goes wrong inside, it will be fatal, and if one is not careful, it is possible that the efforts of Luo Jian and the others in the past few years may be in vain.

Although the policies implemented in Yangzhou have made the lives of the common people much better, they have not changed the situation of extreme inequality between the rich and the poor, and the prosperity and development of industry and commerce have inevitably put capital on the stage of history, and Luo Jian's education since childhood made him have no good impression of capital itself.

After the strike incident led by Liulan in Yangzhou, the treatment of workers improved, but it did not fundamentally solve the problem.

After Luo Jian and Shi Kefa inspected most of the factories in Nanjing and Yangzhou separately, they found that the working conditions in most of the factories were extremely bad, and the treatment of workers was pitifully low compared with the profits of the factories.

The situation in the state-owned factories is relatively better, but there are still many problems, the status of the workers is still very low, and many managers treat the workers as almost inappropriate, and there are also cases of arbitrary beating, scolding, and bullying.

What made Luo Jian and Shi Kefa even more unbearable was that many big businessmen had already set their sights on the provisional government and began to look for their own agents within the government, or simply arranged for the children of the family to enter the relevant government departments.

The Senate is the most active place for big businessmen, and many big businessmen have entered the Senate in the name of taking the initiative to participate in politics, and at the same time they have begun to advocate that the Senate should assume greater responsibility.

And one recent incident that made Luo Jian the most angry was that the provisional government had introduced a law on the protection of workers' rights and interests, which had not yet been promulgated and implemented, and was strongly opposed by the Senate.

This law was specially formulated by Luo Jian and Shi Kefa after in-depth research.

Although it was emphasized in Yangzhou that a large number of workers should be educated in various factories, education always requires a cost, and some businessmen basically did not comply with this regulation in order to save costs, or the implementation was greatly reduced.

Both Luo Jian and Shi Kefa understood that it was impossible for workers who could not read a single word to take the initiative to protect their rights and interests, and that the government should strive for more benefits for these workers when education did not keep up and the overall quality of the worker contingent did not fundamentally change, so the "Law on the Protection of Workers' Rights and Interests" was promulgated.

The interests of the workers were safeguarded, and the profits of the merchants were bound to be reduced. There will be certain opposition to the introduction of this law, Luo Jian and Shi Kefa both thought of it, but they didn't expect their reaction to be so strong, and they used the platform of the Senate to start a confrontation with the provisional government to a certain extent.

Prior to this, although Luo Jian and Shi Kefa had some understanding of these situations, they did not know the specific actions of these businessmen, which made Luo Jian more and more dissatisfied with the role played by the Ministry of Security in recent times, so he considered letting Lai Fu come out to continue to be in charge of the Ministry of Security.

After communicating with Shi Kefa, Shi Kefa agreed with Luo Jian's opinion, but he meant that Lai Fu's position would definitely offend many people. If he still uses his public identity, I am afraid that Lai Fu's previous affairs will be brought out, which will be very unfavorable to the provisional government, so although Lai Fu is still in control of the Ministry of Security, he has become a shadow figure.

Luo Jian sat in his office and thought hard, he always felt that although the situation seemed to be developing very well, it was getting farther and farther away from his goal.

Now Luo Jian has an extremely clear feeling that if the country continues to develop in the current way, some large capitals will soon form large consortia, and these large consortia will soon control the economic lifeline of the entire country, and at that time, the government will probably not listen to them.

In this process, although the living standards and incomes of ordinary people have improved, this is only a longitudinal comparison, and it is a conclusion drawn from the extreme poverty of the last years of the Ming Dynasty, which is extremely disproportionate to the current rate of development.

In other words, the development speed of the entire Nanming region is extremely fast, but the ordinary people do not benefit much from it, and the real benefits are those big businessmen with capital.

Until he got home from work, Luo Jian was still in a trance.

"Xinghua, what's wrong with you? I don't think you're in good spirits, is something happening? Liu Lan stepped forward and asked with concern.

After the two got married, Liu Lan never conceived a child, the old lady was already in a hurry, Luo Jian and Liu Lan both doubted whether this was caused by time and space travel, just when the old lady was about to find the old doctor for Liu Lan to check the pulse, but finally there was good news, Liu Lan was finally pregnant.

Although the old lady insisted that Liu Lan stay at home to raise the baby, Liu Lan was still running around in various factories all day long, and even the newspaper office was going to go every day, although Huang Zongxi had been the deputy editor-in-chief for a long time, but he was still a little inexperienced in the position of editor-in-chief, and Liu Lan had to check it personally.

Gu Yanwu was finally appointed as the governor of Yangzhou, which was the result of repeated weighing and consideration by the five people.

Gu Yanwu served as the editor-in-chief of the "China Daily" for nearly two years, covering the entire Nanming area, and has a deep understanding of the people's livelihood and the political prospects of the provisional government.

Hearing Liu Lan's question, Luo Jian shook his head, Liu Lan is pregnant, and now she is two months old, and her reaction is a little big, and Luo Jian doesn't want her to worry about these troubles.

Just after dinner, Shi Kefa came over.

The temporary offices of the two were very close to each other, and they usually spent a lot of time together, and Shi Kefa hadn't been to Luo Jian's house for a long time, and this was the first time in several months.

"Brother Xian, why are you here? Something, right? Luo Jian asked with a smile, and as he spoke, he let Shi Kefa sit down on the sofa.

"Liu Lan is okay? When I came over, the old lady asked me. Shi Kefa sat down, took a sip of water from his cup, and then said.

"Brother Shi, I'm okay, how is my mother's health? I've been so busy that I haven't been to see her for four or five days. Liu Lan agreed.

"Brother Xian, you didn't just come today to ask Liu Lan, right? What's the matter? Luo Jian asked.

"What's the matter? Nothing good! Shi Ze came to me today, he has been entangled by those businessmen and can't stand it, so we want to make a decision quickly, so that they can die of this heart. Shi Kefa said with a frown.

"You mean the Workers' Rights Protection Act?" Luo Jian also frowned and asked, Regarding this law, Luo Jian and Shi Kefa are both determined to be promulgated and implemented, but some provisions still need to be refined again.

"Alas, isn't that the case, isn't our first railroad about to be built? These businessmen have already seen that this is a 'golden road', and they all want to participate in it. Shi Kefa said with a sigh.

"Hehe, Brother Xian, you are underestimating them too much! Didn't they just take a fancy to this being a 'golden road'? Luo Jian handed Shi Kefa a folder he had just gotten in his hand.

Shi Kefa stretched out his hand to take the folder, looked down, and the more he looked at it, the more ugly his face became.

This document was sent by Laifu's Ministry of Security, and it was about the businessman's intention to take a stake in the construction of the railway.

"Many of them are very discerning, knowing that with the first railway, there will be a second and the hundredth in the future, and then the railway will not only be a railway, it is the lifeblood of a country, and they want to gradually control our lifeline!" Luo Jian waited for Shi Kefa to put down the folder in his hand before he spoke.

"I said Xinghua, I have always felt that you are too weak when it comes to these merchants! On this issue, I think you should learn from Emperor Taizu. Shi Kefa stared at Luo Jian very seriously and said.

Shi Kefa said that when Zhu Yuanzhang, the Taizu of the Ming Dynasty, set the capital of Nanjing, Shen Fu, a big businessman in Huzhou, Zhejiang, later changed his name to Shen You, that is, the richest man in the country at that time, known as "Shen Wansan", funded the construction of one-third of Nanjing City, and when Shen Wansan continued to propose to reward the army, it caused Zhu Yuanzhang's anger.

At that time, when Shen Wansan proposed to reward the three armies, Zhu Yuanzhang asked, "I have a million troops, and you can cover it", Shen Wansan said, "I wish to reward each army with a tael", Zhu Yuanzhang was furious, and ordered "the army and the people of the world should be punished", and later under the persuasion of Queen Ma, Shen Wansan's head was retained, and in 1373 AD, Shen You filled the army in Yunnan.

Hearing Shi Kefa's example of Ming Taizu, Luo Jian and Liu Lan both laughed.

"Brother Shi, if you regard Xinghua as weak and soft-hearted, then you really blame him." Without waiting for Luo Jian to speak, Liu Lan said with a smile first.

"Then let them toss? You see that they have made so much money, let them pay the workers more and pay them better, as if they were killing them. Shi Kefa said dissatisfied.

"Brother Shi, now the development of the economy is inseparable from them, the construction of many factories has penetrated into all aspects of the government's economic work, like Ming Taizu's approach will definitely not work now, as long as the gun is still in hand, the country's economic lifeline is not handed over to them, they can't afford to turn over the waves."

Liu Lan didn't care about this problem, and it was true, these businessmen wanted to control the provisional government that had the gun in their hands, and they didn't have the ability to do so at present.

"Although they can't now, it doesn't mean they can't in the future, we must plan ahead!" Shi Kefa was not satisfied with Liu Lan's statement, and still insisted on his own opinion.