After Hu Zongyu left, Chen Chao began to report on the progress and initial results of promoting villagers' autonomy in Wuding and Jinan.

Although Zhou Fu had the support, the main reason why it was necessary to carry out villagers' self-government in Wuding and several counties in northern Jinan was that the Mengshan Army had a good mass base in this area to fight floods last summer.

Overthrowing the corrupt regime of the Manchu Qing Dynasty and establishing a brand-new state with the Han nationality as the main body and the republic as the state system was Long Qian's stated goal. Inexplicably came to this era, and after giving up being a rich man to spend the rest of his life, all actions revolved around this goal.

He was not arrogant enough to think that he could overthrow a dynasty that had been in power for more than 200 years with some special memory, and he was not arrogant enough to think that he could build a country of his mind. But since the beginning of the twentieth century, poverty and turmoil have followed, and it is almost impossible to find a pure land in your lifetime, even to pursue the life of an ancient hermit is a dream.

If you can't dodge, then don't dodge.

For what is the villagers' autonomy, except for Long Qian, Chen Chao is the person who knows Long Qian's thoughts best, but he doesn't really understand it. In Chen Chao's view, Long Qian tirelessly paid attention to the countryside and the peasants in order to win the support of the peasants for him. If it can be done in Lunan, then it can be done in Shandong. If it can be done in Shandong, then there is no reason why it cannot be done in the eighteen provinces in the north and south.

If it has the support of the peasants all over the world, it is simply unreasonable for the Mengshan Army not to sit in the world.

It was from the support of the peasants in the base area for the Mengshan Army that Chen Chao saw a kind of strength. With this kind of strength, Long Qian led more than a thousand soldiers to do it again and again. Repeatedly confronting the official army is not the strength of a county, a government, or even a province. Chen Chao was shocked by his discovery, he admitted that Long Qian's soldiers were well trained, and Long Qian expected the enemy to be like a god, but without the support of the farmers in the base area, Long Qian was afraid that he would not be able to get out of the mountain nest in Lunan.

Truth be told, there are very few people who have this awareness. Including the generals under Long Qian.

Therefore, Chen Chao devoted himself with great enthusiasm to the villagers' self-government movement in the counties along the Yellow River in northern Shandong. This movement relies on. It's still the Mengshan Army. Not the troops of the Fifth Town, though. It is another armed force that Long Qian has already formed, that is, the reserve force with Ning Shijun as the commander, which is now called the patrol battalion.

Chen Chao believes that the purpose of villagers' autonomy is to win the support of the peasants for the Mengshan Army. That is, the support for Long Qian. The means of this was a combination of the army and the peasantry. Chen Chao, who has read history books, can't remember which dynasty and which army in history have achieved this combination. But Mengshanjun did a really good job. Long Qian's strict military discipline on the common people. and taking the initiative to lead the army north to fight the flood in Chen Chao's opinion, which is simply brilliant, as his work in Wuding and several counties in Jinan is enough to prove this.

Chen Chao's report made Long Qian deeply satisfied. Bai Ruiting, who was listening carefully on the side, felt even more incredible. Can corruption be eradicated by a bunch of spontaneously organized clay legs? Bai Ruiting didn't believe it. As for rent and interest reductions, especially rent reductions. The open-minded Bai Ruiting thinks that it is completely correct, especially in Jiyang County, which has been flooded, and if the peasants are not given a way to live, the government will ask for trouble for itself. In all dynasties, which one is not afraid of homelessness? Who would dare to underestimate the homeless?

"Honesty and good law." Bai Ruiting praised, "Chen Gong is talented, and Bai is full of admiration. After listening to the group of data reported by Chen Chao, Bai Ruiting praised it sincerely. The government also reported that it was a fact that the river embankment was reinforced, and that there were no riots or large-scale displacement in the Jiyang area.

It's nothing short of a miracle. In particular, after Chen Chao asserted that Jiyang County could resume production this year and relief could be reduced on a large scale, Bai Ruiting was extremely shocked in his heart.

Lord Bai praised it falsely. This method was created by retreat. It has been piloted in Lunan for several years. Chen Chao smiled, "There is not only the support of Zhou Futai and Lord Bai, but also the merits of the patrol battalion." Chen didn't dare to take credit. ”

"It's all your own people, so don't praise each other." Long Qian smiled, "It's good that the disaster area can recover its livelihood as soon as possible." Mr. Koshiyuki has worked hard. Long Qian stood up and saluted Chen Chao.

In fact, villager autonomy is by no means as simple as Chen Chao knows. In addition to winning over the peasants to have the foundation to seize the world, Long Qian also had deeper thinking.

Villagers' autonomy began in Zhengjiazhuang, which was Long Qian's attempt to explore and solve a package of problems in rural areas. Stemming from his understanding of agriculture, the countryside and the peasants of later generations, Long Qian firmly believed that the problems of the country could not be truly solved without solving the problems of the rural areas.

In fact, China is now a backward agricultural country. The rural problem is ostensibly a land problem, but its Chinese, medical care, faith, and patriarchal system are entangled, and it is by no means solved by simply solving the land problem.

The one-size-fits-all approach adopted by later generations to turn the main occupants of land into dispossessors, and then use the method of dispossession to set off a stormy revolution by dispossessing the expropriators, seems to be a way to learn from. The handling of the bully Zheng Jing has seen the promise of this path. The composition of Long Qian's small team at that time also determined the feasibility of taking that road. However, if you go that way, you will basically put an end to the compromise with the imperial court. But weighing the pros and cons, Long Qian firmly believed that he did not have the strength to overthrow the huge Manchu dynasty with a few hundred men. At that time, it was not the Manchu aristocracy that opposed the Mengshan army, but the huge power of Han intellectuals as the backbone who controlled most of the country's wealth and strength. Just as Zeng Guofan drafted the "Discussion of Cantonese Bandits" in a righteous and strict manner, the Han elite did not regard the Mengshan Army as a righteous army, but regarded it as a flood of fierce beasts and recklessly cut it off.

It all stems from the unwavering protection of private property.

Long Qian admits that the German named Karl was a genius, or at least a great theorist. The theories he put forward may not all be correct, but one of them is an irrefutable truth, that is, those so-called righteous men and gentlemen, social elites, can be discredited, but vested interests are absolutely inviolable.

Long Qian acknowledges social injustice. It is also recognized that equity is not equality, but equality of opportunity. As far as the countryside is concerned, there are mixed fish and dragons, good and bad, including bullies in the fish and meat towns such as Zheng Jing, and virtuous people like Chen Chao who pursue the true meaning of Confucianism. It would be unfair to use a simple criterion of possession of property to distinguish between the revolution and the revolutionary. Later generations eradicated private property by stormy and iron-blooded means, regardless of whether it was fair or not. The consequence will be to eradicate the cultural focus of this great unified country formed since the Qin and Han dynasties—gentleness, courtesy, frugality, benevolence, righteousness, courtesy, wisdom and faithfulness, which have freed the Chinese from the fine traditions and virtues of ignorance and barbarism.

Moreover, the conditions are even more inadequate. It was after decades of preparation that a well-disciplined party composed of outstanding elements of the time was created, and the lives of countless pioneers were sacrificed to create a majestic force of the new revolution. Long Qian did not think that he could awaken the ignorant, selfish, and cowardly peasants all over the world, so that they could follow him without hesitation to create an ideal New World realm.

However, improvement or change is necessary. The countryside cannot be allowed to sink like this. What is the purpose of change? Long Qian thought about it countless times on his own. Numerous corrections. The first is, of course, to improve people's livelihood and lift rural areas out of poverty. The main method is to set up industries to absorb the surplus population in the rural areas and reduce the pressure on land. The second is to increase the yield per mu through a series of methods and solve the problem of having a full stomach. The key to this is to ensure that the cultivator has his land. The so-called ideals and consciousness can never be worth the benefits.

Long Qian's selection of the test field is the Zhengjiazhuang base. Relying on the two major industrial groups in Lunan. Vigorously recruit young farmers in the base areas. Over the past two years, nearly 2,000 people have been recruited from the base area to work in the city. The effect is obvious, according to the statistics of Chen Chao and later Xiao Guanyu, in the past two years. The per capita income of the villages in the base areas has doubled by as much as 150 percent! Of course, the credit should be credited to the industrial group, and the income of a young peasant who goes to the city to work is four times or even higher than that in the township.

As a matter of fact, there are two other reasons for the increase in income: The first is the rise of the Mengshan Army, and a large number of peasants in the base areas have received military salaries and sent them back to their hometowns after joining the army, which has directly increased the income of their hometowns. The second is the rise of coal mines and handicrafts in the base areas.

Long Qian still doesn't know the way, just the contribution of the children of the base to his hometown has made Zhengjiazhuang Township, which was established after the founding of the People's Republic of China, a less glorious title, "Lao Zhangren Township".

In terms of increasing agricultural income, the effect is not obvious, and the limited improvement of water conservancy is not enough to completely change the appearance, and the establishment of invalids farms can indeed accommodate some disabled soldiers, but it does not really play a role in guiding agriculture. Long Qian didn't believe in the reports and statistics about the Invalids Farm, and he could breed a good seed with a few crippled soldiers? Can it improve soil fertility? Bragging. He has not yet encountered an agricultural expert in the modern sense.

Of course, the change in the rural areas should start with improving the peasants' incomes, but the fundamental problem is that the rural areas are in a primitive state, and the self-sufficient small-scale peasant economy is adapted to the cultural and organizational structure of the rural areas. Without changing the overall quality of the peasants, it is impossible to completely break the situation of the small-scale peasant economy. In particular, due to the extreme backwardness of cultural instructions and the existence of a large number of illiterate people, the elements of the modern state, such as the state, nation, power, and obligations, will not be spread to the rural areas, and it will be impossible to eradicate the feudal toxins of thousands of years. I have not experienced anything farther, but I participated in the Gengzi national disaster four years ago, and countless peasants in the Gyeonggi area were willing to serve as masters for the invading army for a very small reward, and even more, it was completely traitors to transmit information to the invading army, or to be formed by the invading army to form a puppet army to attack the official army. It is in the base areas that the peasants care about the victory or defeat of their soldiers and the survival of their children, but they do not care about the losses and tribulations suffered by the country and the nation. The huge indemnity of 300 million taels of silver, and the fact that the army of their own country is not allowed to be stationed on the line from Tianjin to Shanhaiguan do not seem to have anything to do with them. The patriarchal system binds all the countryside, not to mention the legal consciousness in the modern sense, and even few people understand the laws of the Qing Dynasty. The patriarch or landlord can control the life and death of the peasants, and the country in the eyes of the peasants is their village and their family.

Therefore, Long Qian organized the villagers' self-government committee, the purpose of which was to liberate the peasants from the snare of the patriarchal system. The core purpose is to let the peasants gradually come into contact with the rights and obligations through the signboard of the self-government committee, learn to manage themselves, and finally become qualified citizens.

"Lord Bai, Mr. Yuezhi, the law of villagers' autonomy needs to be gradually improved, and it must be adapted to local conditions. This activity, which is guided by river control and disaster relief, will continue to be deepened. Train the backbone, summarize experience, and form a set of system processes applicable to the whole province. Long Qian ended the debriefing meeting.

"Bai will go to the north as soon as possible."

"That's very good. However, will Lord Yang allow us to continue? ”

"It doesn't matter. The trend of the times, such as an individual in the midst of a torrent, the wise can only take advantage of the situation, how can they reverse the overall situation? Bai Ruiting smiled, "However, it seems that it is time for the military gate to meet Lord Futai." ”

"Seeing is a must, people are the head of a province. However, it would be unwise to stop the construction of county schools and the renovation of highways. Long Qian said.

"I must be reluctant in my heart. All those who are sensible applaud the establishment of county schools in our province. Bai Ruiting stroked the beard on his chin and said slowly.

"Ha Luha, Lord Bai doesn't need to worry. Enriching my homeland of Qilu saints should be our common wish. Presumably Lord Yang will be no exception, right? ”

Long Qian didn't want to unite several high-ranking officials to force Yang Shixiang into the palace. Let's talk to the governor first, if we can work together to prosper Shandong, we should not consider its background. (To be continued......)