"Your Majesty..." The old prince Zhu Yiming is still a very responsible king. He really regards himself as an elder of the clan, and he is still here to make plans for the "young and energetic" Zhu Youjian. He thought and said:

"Don't think that one province is big and one prefecture is small, so you don't have to worry about delegating power to one prefecture. In fact, there are quite a few prefectures in the south that are quite powerful, no less than one province! For example, Jingzhou Prefecture in Huguang has been controlling power since ancient times.

It is the key point of Jingzhou and Xiangzhou, and it has many people, vast fields and paddy fields. It can be said that half of the essence of Huguang Province is in Jingzhou! In terms of financial and material resources, no province in the north may be as good as Jingzhou.

!”

At this time, Jingzhou Prefecture in Huguang had at least tens of millions of acres of paddy fields. In terms of harvest, the nearly 30 million acres of dry land in Shaanxi could not compare with the 10 million acres of paddy fields in Jingzhou Prefecture.

The old prince Zhu Yiming thought deeply and said: "As for the big mansions that are as rich as Jingzhou, there are Chengtian, Wuchang and Changsha in Huguang. These four mansions all occupy large areas of plains, with convenient transportation, rich paddy fields and large populations.

In addition, as far as I know, Chongqing Prefecture in Sichuan, Chengdu Prefecture in Guangdong, and Guangzhou Prefecture in Guangdong are all very powerful and powerful prefectures, with a large number of people and abundant money. Moreover, the places are either close to barbarian territory, have strong folk customs, or have coastal defense.

Port. If the imperial court wants to grant the military power to the big government, one or two thousand people will not be enough, but five or six thousand will be needed! If there are several big houses with evil intentions in those places, the disaster of the vassal towns in Tang Dynasty will be inevitable.

"

The old prince has a good heart, but his vision is not broad. For generations, his family has been trapped in the palm-sized city of Xiangyang. In fact, they are just sitting in a well and watching the sky. In his opinion, having a palace and controlling 5,000 elite soldiers is enough to separate one side.

Already......

Of course, Zhu Youjian's policy of granting great power to the government did have the possibility of separatizing the vassal towns. However, it would not be possible to segregate the vassal towns by relying only on five or six thousand elite soldiers, unless the prefects and governors governed the local areas on behalf of the Ming Dynasty.

The local wealthy families collude!

Just like in the late Eastern Han Dynasty, a county governor who received the support of local noble families could easily transform into a separatist force!

In addition, what kind of government requires five to six thousand soldiers to guard it? Isn’t it a wealthy and powerful government? For example, the Guangzhou government mentioned by the old man requires five to six thousand soldiers.

In Guangfu, there are four tyrannical forces: Western barbarians, pirates, private merchants, and native guest clans. Moreover, there are a lot of firearms in the place. Not to mention that everyone has a gun, at least the Western barbarians, pirates, private merchants, and native tribes have guns.

The four major forces of the Hakka clan are all equipped with guns.

With one or two thousand troops, let alone forcing those guys to pay taxes, it would be difficult to even protect themselves!

Therefore, five to six thousand troops are necessary, and ruthless people with sufficient abilities are needed to dig out money from these four major forces.

As for the Zhu Ming court, if the Guangfu government and the Xiyi, pirates, private merchants, and native guest clans join forces, then they can really separate the empire.

"It is impossible to separate the empire with only five or six thousand elite soldiers, at least not when the world is peaceful." Zhu Youjian said with a smile, "But you still have to be on guard against others! And I will guard against these people.

The way to run the army, dismount the horse and govern the people, and turn the powerful mansion into a rebel town is to not let the big mansion and the rich family collude... you have to let the big mansion and the rich family restrain each other!"

"How do the big mansion and the wealthy family restrain each other?" The old prince didn't understand again.

Zhu Youjian said: "My method is to have the governor negotiate taxes with the wealthy families on behalf of the court, and then the government will be responsible for collecting the negotiated taxes... In this way, there will be a connection between the imperial court and the local wealthy families.

If you have something to do, you can discuss it carefully first. The prefect who governs the local area is a villain, responsible for collecting taxes and suppressing dissent!"

"Let the wealthy family negotiate taxes with the governor? This..." the old prince Zhu Yiming stroked his beard, "I have to think about it carefully. How can the imperial court discuss tax collection with the people below?"

"Haha," Zhu Youjian smiled, "Grandpa, haven't I been discussing with you these days?"

"And me..." The old prince Zhu Yiming was stunned when he heard this, "I am different from them!"

Zhu Youjian nodded and said with a smile: "Yes... you are my great-uncle and grandfather. Naturally, you are different from the people below, but you are also a wealthy person! You have the most farmland in Xiangyang Prefecture, right?"

Shouldn't we have a good discussion with you about collecting land taxes?

In addition, the princes of Chu, Liao, Jing, Ji, Rong, Hui, and Gui are all from wealthy families... We must discuss it carefully first, and then think of other solutions!"

The meaning of a good discussion is that the princes will happily take the lead in paying taxes, and the soldiers who want food will not visit their homes, and Zhu Youjian will not have to use the cunning trick of moving the town to seal the city to deal with them.

To be honest, it is quite troublesome to move the town and enclose it. Although you can get a lot of land during the transfer process. However, the size of the housekeeper group available to Zhu Youjian is also limited and cannot manage so much land. However, these lands are distributed to

In the state capital, the rent is one or two dou per acre.

If those princes were willing to pay taxes according to the standard of one mu per acre, Zhu Youjian would not bother... And keeping these Huguang vassal princes has a great use - he can raise food through them.

Most of the vassal kings in the Ming Dynasty were engaged in business, and the Huguang vassal king's business was food - if Huguang is cooked, the world will have enough!

Due to the rapid development of the textile industry in the southeast and the floods of the Huaihe River, a large amount of land in the land of fish and rice in the southeast has been replanted with mulberry cotton with higher economic value. Grain production has been declining, so that grain needs to be imported from Huguang.

The eight vassal kings of Huguang were all big landowners and had tax-free privileges, so they naturally developed into grain merchants.

Through these "eight business kings", Zhu Youjian can promote the Huguang area to increase rice planting area in the next few years by placing large orders for rice - Huguang's grain production capacity is much higher than the needs of the local people, and this production capacity

Whether it is fully utilized depends on whether you pay for it.

In the famine years of the previous life, because the imperial court had no financial resources, the economies of Henan, Shandong, Shaanxi, Beizhili and other places were on the verge of collapse due to the looting by rogue bandits and Donglu. In addition, Huguang itself was repeatedly ravaged by rogue bandits, so the food supply

Capacity is not fully utilized...

Only then did the old prince Zhu Yiming remember that those "rich families" who did not pay taxes in Zhu Youjian's words turned out to include vassal princes like himself. His face was a little ugly, and he coughed a few times: "Your Majesty, you and the old minister

How can such a vassal have any need to negotiate? Wherever it is needed, just give an order."

"It has to be discussed! How can we not discuss it?" Zhu Youjian said with a smile, "Although this dynasty treats the vassal king favorably, the vassal ban is too strict, and it is like treating the vassal king as a thief to guard against... This

It’s not necessary either. The vassal king can also serve the country!”

"Long live my lord," the old prince Zhu Yiming swallowed, "do you mean that the prince can also be an official?"

"Not only can I be an official, but I can also lead troops!" Zhu Youjian extended his thumb and pointed at himself, "I was also a vassal king... If the late emperor had not conquered Bintian at a young age, I would have

It has to be circled. Then all my abilities will be buried? If the Ming Dynasty didn't have me, would the country be as stable as Mount Tai?"

The old prince thought to himself: You are so humble! You probably don’t know that many people in Huguang Shilin think that you are a foolish king and have angered God, so that is why so many natural disasters have been brought down... They

I still want you to issue an edict to punish yourself!

Zhu Youjian then said: "I have to trouble my uncle and grandfather to bring these ideas to the princes of Chu, Liao, Jing, Ji, Rong, Hui, Gui and so on! They are in charge of Jingzhou, Wuchang, Changsha, Changde

, Hengzhou... Let them contact the wealthy and powerful households in these places, and select people with the final say to come to Xiangyang Mansion to discuss with me how the government and gentry should pay grain and tax together, and how to increase the tax on acres of land in Huguang.

matter!
Chapter completed!