Of course, Liang Qichao, who was in Shanghai, did not know that he was already the role of Yang Rui who was destined to sink the Mariana Trench to plant lotus roots, but more and more gentlemen rejected him and made him more and more aware of his embarrassing situation, and a few months later, when Tang Hualong was gone, he regretted that he should not have shirked the opportunity to meet Yang Rui. After that, the only thing he could do was to run a free newspaper with Tang Jueton, Zhang Junli, Jiang Baili and others in Shanghai.

Compared with his departure from Shanghai a few years ago, the press control is now more relaxed, but the sales of the Free Press are becoming less and less satisfactory, and finally the newspaper was suddenly caught fire and had to go bankrupt and dissolve, and he finally left politics and became a professor at Fudan University in Shanghai; For current affairs, it is just to write comments and earn some manuscript fees, so that the name of Liang Rengong is still retained in the eyes of readers, but in fact, he and his magic pen are no longer important.

More and more gentry and landlords joined the Trinity Church, the social atmosphere became more and more restricted, the vernacular in newspaper articles became less and less, and there were more and more obscure words and phrases, and everything seemed to go before Gengzi and even before the self-improvement movement. And the world is becoming more and more ancient - even in an international port like Shanghai, there are fewer and fewer people wearing suits, and more and more people wear national uniforms.

To be honest, the change in social atmosphere is not only due to the Trinity Church, but also to the Chinese government—on the twenty-seventh day of the eighth month of the summer calendar of the 14th year of Shenwu, the Trinity Church was established as the state religion by the Inspectorate of Suspicions; On the twenty-sixth day of the twelfth month of the fourteenth year of Shenwu, the clan management law was voted on by the Inspectorate; On the third day of February in the 15th year of Shenwu, the land reform compensation bill submitted by the Trinity Church and the National Federation of Clans was submitted to the Inspectorate for discussion. In October of that year, it was voted and passed at the general meeting of the Inspector's Yuan......

Like an ordinary spectator, Liang Qichao, who is at Fudan University in Shanghai, watched the actors on the stage perform as he had guessed. Such a vivid sense of purpose made him both envious and hateful, if he hadn't made a mistake back then. He can also be left and right on this stage, but he can make people, and he can only be a spectator now.

Not only a spectator, but also a spectator who can only applaud. He could not oppose the establishment of Trinity Church as the state religion, because he was originally a Confucian student, and there was nothing wrong with respecting national studies; He also could not oppose the clan administration law, because he himself was in the relationship between the clan and the villagers, and once he objected, he did not mention anything else. In this life, I am afraid that I will not be able to return to Xinhui to worship my ancestors; He could not even oppose the land reform compensation case, because this was what he had advocated before, and it was precisely because of this that he was exempt from prosecution if he did not really participate in the Yunnan rebellion.

Religion, clan, land compensation, as soon as the three far-reaching bills were passed, then some things after that were logical: in July of the 15th year of Shenwu, because the Fuxing Association did not want to use the property to compensate the landlords, Tianzihao applied for liquidation and separation with the state-owned company; December, the most critical step of privatization. That is, the bill on the reorganization of the national bank was finally passed under the strong initiative of the Kuomintang -- four banks, including the Bank of Kwantung Province, the Overseas Chinese Commercial Bank, the Bank of Mongolia, and the Northwest Bank, merged with 19 provincial banks in the Guannai to invest in the national bank with the cash of the state-owned company's stocks, part of the assets of Tianzihao, and the cash held by the major private banks compensated by the land compensation bill, and the national bank was reorganized into the only note-issuing bank of a private nature.

Also in December, Tao Shouhe, the son of the late Tao Chengzhang, the secretary of the Ministry of Agriculture, handed over the case of canceling the agricultural tax was voted and passed by the Inspectorate. The agricultural tax that had lasted for thousands of years finally withdrew from the stage of history, and the 400 million peasants across the country rejoiced, and on Chinese New Year's Eve, they not only thanked the imperial halls of each county. He also knelt and bowed in the direction of the Jingshi.

At this point, the privatization performance that began with Shenwu 13 is basically over. The following year, the sixteenth year of Shenwu was the election year of the Inspectorate of Doubts. It was only then that the 400 million peasants discovered that with the abolition of the agricultural tax, the original suffrage had also disappeared (and in the future they might find that the abolished agricultural tax was hidden in the fertilizer and all other necessities of life). But that was a very fortuitous thing very much later.) According to the statistics of the Internal Taxation Bureau, the number of voters in this election is the smallest in the history of the founding of the People's Republic of China, with only more than 6.3 million, including some high-ranking workers, civil servants, military officers, and some yeoman farmers and handicraftsmen who are subject to personal income tax.

The number of voters with the right to vote has been reduced from 80 million to a fraction of the previous one, which makes the previous method of canvassing in the countryside completely useless, and the voters who really have the right to vote can be found in the county seat, even if they do not live in the county seat, they can also spread the word through the business gentry in the county seat. This is the north, in the southeastern provinces, if you want to get votes, you must be friendly with the clans in the counties, because most of the votes in the county are controlled by the clans, and if you talk well with the clan chiefs, then you only need one meal, and the election will be completely done.

Liang Qichao, who has been watching all this coldly, has nothing else to do except write articles, although he also pays personal income tax, but Shanghai is just a guest place for him, even if someone suggests that he run, he also laughs - although the leading people in Shanghai admire his knowledge, but he is an outsider after all, how can those Shanghainese and Ningbo people vote for him?

Liang Qichao, a former big man, is very clear about his current situation, but Song Jiaoren, the leader of the Kuomintang who is still a big man, is a little crying and laughing at his current situation.

First of all, the country now seems to have returned to the days when he was a young student, and Hu Shih, who preached the good guy government at Yenching University in Beijing, and others believed that the whole country was regressing and descending into terrible barbarism. Although I do not fully agree with the views of Hu Shi and others, for Song Jiaoren, who has been abroad, the current changes are indeed a little difficult to adapt;

Secondly, in the past few years, he feels that he is the puppet of Yang Jingcheng and others, of course, if he is not a puppet, he will not have any impact on the overall situation, and in order to revive the control of the Inspectorate, any bill can be passed smoothly as long as it does not violate the constitution. The only thing that is a little mysterious is the restructuring of the National Bank, which after all involves the right to issue the Chinese dollar, but if the restructuring plan is not agreed, under the gold bar standard, the major provincial banks can use cash to empty all the gold in the national bank, and once the gold is lost, the Chinese dollar will be worthless. This will then cause an economic shock, and then the representatives of the revival committee will be able to use it as an excuse to stabilize the market. The proposed merger of the National Bank and the Private Bank is also equivalent to the restructuring of the National Bank.

These are on the level of facts. Another reason is that the sponsors of the Kuomintang over the years are all bankers, and Soong Jiaoren can guarantee his innocence, but he cannot guarantee the innocence of others. The restructuring of the National Bank is the most awaited thing by the banking community, and there is no guarantee of what will happen if it is opposed.

cooperation, you can become the fourth prime minister of China; Without cooperation, the KMT will inevitably split or withdraw from politics. This kind of multiple-choice question can be done by fools, but after making the 'right choice', Song Jiaoren found more and more that the whole country seemed to be hollowed out. Even if he becomes the prime minister, his authority is limited, and his actions are limited, is this really the result he wants?

In December of the 16th year of Shenwu, Song Jiaoren, who was in the Hufang Qiaohuguang Hall in the capital, was in a daze at his campaign speech, and he wanted to tear up this official article more and more. According to the previous agreement, no matter how many seats the Kuomintang occupies in the Inspectorate this time, the prime minister will be his.

"Sir, the Prime Minister called. Say that there is something important to invite you to go to the meeting. The deceased Tan Renfeng's eldest son, Tan Yihong, knocked on the door and came in to report that he was now Song Jiaoren's full-time secretary.

"Did you say something was going on?" Song Jiaoren put down his cigarette and asked. As Yang Rui's term of office is coming to an end, the two have more and more negotiations about government affairs - many of them are telling him something, where and where not to move, which is really annoying.

"It's government affairs." Tan Yihong replied. "The venue is about to be in the Zhenguo Mansion, and it is said that it is tonight's family banquet, please take your husband and wife to the appointment on time."

"Alright. I see, you help me tell my family. Don't make dinner. Song Jiaoren said, and after instructing him, he said again: "Remember to say that it was a family banquet." You don't have to change into any luxurious clothes. ”

"Yes, sir." As Song Jiaoren's secretary, Tan Yihong certainly understood what Song Jiaoren was worried about - like most people in this era, Song Jiaoren's wife was also an old vulgar woman who had not seen much of the world, and was four years older than him. Fortunately, his wife never complained about his strange behavior, and gave birth to a son, so the marriage has been stable for decades, and there is no idea of taking a concubine. But this was before, after the founding of the People's Republic of China, as the leader of the Kuomintang, his wife Fang Kuaijie was a little unable to get on the stage, so every time he went out to socialize and go to a banquet, Song Jiaoren had to carefully advise him.

At the beginning of the lanterns, Song Jiaoren, who was driving a Volkswagen, took his wife to Yang's mansion for a banquet, and he just entered the door when he saw Yang Wuming who was limping, he greeted Song Jiaoren with a smile, and then guided him to drive the car to the parking lot 'quickly'. Yang Rui's three sons and one daughter, in Song Jiaoren's opinion, this eldest son is the most sensible and decent, although he is more like Cheng Ying, not so tough, but more handsome, but it's a pity that he is lame, otherwise the four beautiful men in China may be on the list.

Carefully parking the car, Song Jiaoren looked at the busy crowd and trucks in the parking lot, and asked curiously, "Virtuous nephew, what is this?" ”

"Oh......" Seeing that Song Jiaoren was curious about the moving team, Yang Wuming smiled and said: "Mr. Dunchu doesn't know, my father doesn't want to get involved in politics anymore after this term, so this country mansion no longer lives, and some things have to be moved to Tonghua early." ”

"Oh, that's right." Song Jiaoren is prepared for Yang Rui's withdrawal from politics, but he is a little unaccustomed to starting to move now-there seems to be a feeling of indescribable emptiness. With Yang Rui here, he, the next prime minister, can't be swayed at will, but Yang Rui is not there, once something major happens, Beijing lacks a real backbone.

After stepping through several layers of doors in a row, Song Jiaoren heard Yang Rui's hearty laughter from a distance, and he waved under the street lamp, and said loudly: "Rui has never been far away, and it is no wonder that he has escaped at the beginning." ”

"There, there." Song Jiaoren was polite, and Sister Fang Kuai next to him was also blessed with the standard, and she didn't embarrass him.

"It's very punctual when you first come." Two more voices said, this is Xie Zhangtai of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Vice Premier Zhang Taiyan.

"The Prime Minister's dinner must be on time." Song Jiaoren smiled and saluted them again.

"Okay, in the winter, let's not be polite, just go in and talk." As a landlord, Yang Ruidao.

In some old banquet halls, the hot pot on the dinner table is already steaming, and the hall is equipped with air conditioning, even if Song Jiaoren takes off his coat, he feels hot all over his body, and after three rounds of wine, he even takes off the remaining two close-fitting clothes, he recalls the wine in the cup and says: "This is the wine of Moutai Town?" ”

Yang Rui drank rice wine this time, and Song Jiaoren was a guest from afar, so of course he drank good wine. He didn't have time to speak yet. Zhang Taiyan, who was greedy for cups, smiled and said: "It's Moutai, if you like it at the beginning." I'm going to get drunk today. ”

"Don't dare, don't dare, if you're really drunk. That would be rude. Song Jiaoren smiled with a red face, then looked at Yang Rui and asked, "Brother Cheng came to call to invite me today, I can't get drunk now." ”

Song Jiaoren Yang Rui just smiled, and he also felt that he was almost eating and drinking, so he put down his wine glass and said, "In a few days, the results of the election of the Inspectorate will come out; At the end of the year, it is the prime minister's election; Before the beginning of spring and Qingming. I'm going to retreat. I'll take a toast first, I'm afraid it's been more than 20 years since I met you......"

"Twenty-two years." Song Jiaoren recalled the first meeting between the two in Tokyo, and sighed a little.

"Yes, twenty-two years. In the past 22 years, there has been a lot of support for me and the revival association, but it is rare that we will make a general statement and give in, and our two parties have worked together to achieve today's achievements in China. "Yang Rui wants to pay tribute to Song Jiaoren, and Xie Zhangtai and Zhang Taiyan also want to raise their glasses to each other. All of a sudden, the table was lively again.

After this round of wine was drunk, Yang Rui looked at Song Jiaoren, whose face was flushed, before mentioning the matter, and he said: "When I took over at the beginning of the year, I only had three things to worry about. The first is diplomacy. The second is internal affairs, and the third is the economy.

Diplomats, in fact, China is two strong neighbors. One is Northwest Soviet Russia, and the other is Southeast America. As for Britain and France, they are only the masters of the defense. As long as we don't move them. They are afraid of us and afraid that we will not be in time, so as long as we are impartial. Soviet Russia is different from the United States, Soviet Russia is extremely expansive, and it is eager for the whole world to be red, but fortunately, their new general secretary Stalin, is a steady and conservative person, and now he is engaged in electrification construction, as long as we do not provoke him, he will not move us, Soviet Russia has implemented the five-year plan for several years, as long as they are not deliberately stimulated, everyone will still be fine.

Since the anti-Chinese incident in the 13th year of Shenwu, we and Japan have strictly controlled the examination and approval of visas to the United States, and smuggling has also been suppressed, so the number of overseas Chinese in the United States is now less than 80,000, and it will be further reduced. If there is a dispute between the two countries because of overseas Chinese, it is not impossible to withdraw all of them. ”

"This ......" Song Jiaoren also knows that after the exclusion of Chinese in the United States, the number of overseas Chinese in the United States has dropped sharply, and the last two terms have been in power by the Republican Party, and in order to alleviate the pressure on employment, the number of immigrants has been extremely strict, and I don't want Yang Rui to actually want to withdraw all overseas Chinese in the United States. Is this the same attitude in Japan? If the United States evacuates overseas Chinese, what about Canada and the entire Americas? ”

Bismarck said that the alliance between nations is the relationship between riders and animals. Between China and Japan, we must be riders, they are livestock. If we would rather evacuate our nationals than avoid conflict with the United States, then of course they should do the same, not the other way around. Yang Rui said domineeringly, he was actually a little worried that Song Jiaoren didn't know how to control the Japanese, but fortunately, China is not a presidential system, and the Inspectorate can veto his outdated policies at any time. The evacuation of overseas Chinese is only carried out in a situation where there is no way to do it, and if countries such as Mexico and Brazil want to do the same, then they should try the power of our shells. ”

"But what if the United States is involved?" America is the Americas of the Americans, and Song Jiaoren had to ask.

"Then fire too!" Yang Rui will not back down this time. "The evacuation of overseas Chinese is only aimed at the United States, if other American countries massacre overseas Chinese, then the navy must open fire, otherwise the entire American countries will reject overseas Chinese, if we completely retreat in the Americas, then overseas Chinese in Southeast Asia and other places will not be guaranteed, there are millions of people here."

Yang Rui said that after seeing Song Jiaoren pondering, he said: "The safety of overseas Chinese affects diplomacy, especially the relationship with the United States. The national strength of the United States is not something that we can resist, and China and Japan together will double it, which is still a lot worse than the United States, so the country needs to cut taxes - no matter how much government investment is, the industry is still inferior to the United States, and if there is really going to war, it is nothing more than a question of whether the United States has 100 warships or 20 warships, not to mention 30, even if 40 warships? Fight down or lose.

The best and only way to deal with the United States is to avoid it. After a few decades, when we have developed well, then we can speak louder, and it is really unwise to go to the hard top with others now. After the beginning of the escape, you will be angry with many Americans, and you must not be rash. Because of small losses and big losses, we will never be able to win once the war starts. You see. In the anti-Chinese case in the thirteenth year of Shenwu, so many people died. I can't just put up with it. ”

Yang Rui's words made Song Jiaoren nod frequently, although China and Japan are calling for wind and rain in Asia, and they may not be weaker to Britain and France, they are still not enough to see the United States. If economic data are not compared, the United States has 45 million tons of steel, while China, even if it expands every year, it will only be 9 million tons, and Japan is only a little more than 10 million. To fight a war is to fight industry, and only one-fifth of the industrial level of the United States. There's really no way to fight.

Seeing that Song Jiaoren understood what he meant, and also knew that he was not a low-mouthed person like Wilhelm II, Yang Rui was a little relieved. He added: "In Northeast Asia, North Korea is the most important; From the perspective of East Asia, Japan is the most important; From the perspective of Asia, Persia is the most important; From the perspective of the world, Soviet Russia is the most important. The focus of our diplomacy lies in this sentence, and the answer to any diplomatic problems that we really want to encounter at the beginning of the year can be found here. ”

'Look at Northeast Asia. North Korea is the most important; From the perspective of East Asia, Japan is the most important; From the perspective of Asia, Persia is the most important; From the perspective of the world, Soviet Russia is the most important. Song Jiaoren silently recited what Yang Rui said. After remembering it, he said, "I became a brother, so what should we think?" ”

The trick though. But the key is how to position yourself. Seeing Song Jiaoren asking, Xie Zhangtai said, "Escape at the beginning." It's hard to answer the question you asked, so I'm going to talk about it. It's not something that can be said overnight. It turned out to be just a framework, and the specific details will be explained when you take over the Prime Minister's Office, but the explanation is an explanation, and you will have to adapt to the situation in the future. ”

"Chong'an is right." Yang Rui took over, "Diplomacy requires both principles and changes, and it depends on how to weigh it at the beginning."

The above is about diplomacy, and then about internal affairs. The internal affairs are now basically straightened out, the three levels of the county government and the province have begun to implement autonomy, and the fiefs outside the customs - in fact, Uncle Mei originally wanted to divide the feuds, but the resistance in the customs was so strong that he had to get them outside the customs, and to be more serious, this is not a sub-feudal at all, this is just similar to the Ottoman Timar system, and the Timar system is derived from the European military fiefdom system.

This kind of military mining system also existed in the Zhou Dynasty, and the so-called feudal system, patriarchal system, well field system, and mining system were the foundation of the political system of the Zhou Dynasty. In my opinion, this is no different from local autonomy, except that under self-government, the county magistrate takes turns to sit in the village, and the system of mining is hereditary. In fact, this is mainly to comfort the heroes, although it is said that the mill is unloaded and the donkey is killed, but now it is still grinding, and no one will do the things behind the donkey. ”

It doesn't matter if it's divided into seals or mined towns. Song Jiaoren laughed at this, this involved the entire military merit group, even if he wanted to, he couldn't move, not to mention that most of the people sitting in the Congress were people from the Revival Society. Fortunately, Yang Rui only passed by on this, and the next thing to talk about was the economy.

"According to the CIA report in the past two years, the world economy is not optimistic, and it is likely to collapse in the next year or two." Yang Rui was alarmist at the beginning. "There are two sources of the crisis, the first is the inflated American economy during the European war, in order not to cause a strike, the Americans have been stimulating the economy, but no matter how much it is stimulated, it is a bubble, and the bubble will burst one day, and this day will not be long before it comes;

The second is Europe, Britain, France, Italy, and Germany, all four of which owe money to the United States, Germany owes Britain, France, and Italy, and Britain, France, and Italy owe the United States. The fundamental reason why the European economy is still in the past is that the United States is constantly exporting dollars, so that the economy can barely circulate, and once the United States withdraws funds, the European economy, especially the German economy, will have to stop.

At that time, the entire world economy will have to make a hard landing, and whoever has a big bubble will fall hard. Although we export a lot of goods to Europe and the United States, the competitiveness is not bad; And on the side of Soviet Russia, they carried out a five-year plan, and most of those contracts were signed with us; In addition, our domestic demand is strong, agricultural taxes have been reduced, roads have been repaired, grain and cotton production has increased year by year, and the people have become rich, so the impact of the crisis will be there, but it will not be very serious. ”

"So what is the government going to do?" Song Jiaoren had known the prediction of the economic crisis, but he did not expect it to be during his tenure.

"There is only so much the government can do, but the most important thing is to encourage market confidence. The most feared thing is that the economic crisis is coming, and then everyone is afraid to spend money, and the more they don't spend money, the more depressed the market will be, and finally everyone is afraid to spend money. Yang Rui said. Internally encourage market confidence; Externally, the Ministry of Commerce is already in the process of signing new trade treaties with other countries, and the provisions in them have fully taken into account the economic crisis, so I believe that when the time comes for countries around the world to raise tariffs on each other, we will basically trade with Asian countries, South American, Central American countries, and European countries on the principle of reciprocal trade.

As for the four great powers of Britain, the United States, France, and the Soviet Union, the Soviet Union has already negotiated, its five-year plan has been launched, and we have the upper hand; Britain, the United States, and France are not easy to discuss, among which the United States is the most hopeless, France only wants to have a trade surplus, and the franc is deliberately depreciated, and it is difficult to talk about it, only Britain has the possibility of peace talks, but there are many countries in the British Commonwealth, and if they themselves do not want to, they may not succeed in negotiating one by one, so in the end they can only act at the opportunistic. (To be continued.) )