After Huang Shunfu was transferred to the General Military Mansion, the new magistrate of Luling was named Li Ke.
This person does not have a high degree of education, he was just a child.
But he followed Zhao Han very early. He was a self-cultivated farmer in Lijiaguai. He helped divide the fields in the early days, then joined the missionary group, and later became the mayor of the town. Then he was transferred to the county government. It was a natural thing to succeed him as the county magistrate.
"Greetings to the chief!" Li Ke said with cupped hands.
Zhao Han smiled and said, "Please sit down."
"Thank you, Mr. Zhen." Li Ke straightened his back and sat down.
"I read the brochure you handed over," Zhao Han asked, "about peasant marriages, how were they resolved in the past?"
There were a lot of mistakes in the division of farmland between the three counties.
As long as they are over twelve years old, both men and women can have land. But what happens if a woman gets married? Should the land in her name belong to her mother's family or her husband's family?
According to the equality of men and women, it naturally belongs to the woman herself, and she can take it with her wherever she marries.
But how could the woman’s family agree!
Li Ke replied: "When we exchange fields and get married, people from two families marry both their daughters and their daughters-in-law."
Zhao Han frowned and said: "If there are only daughters or only sons in the family, wouldn't it be impossible to get married?"
Li Ke said: "It's difficult."
Zhao Han immediately called Chen Maosheng over. After explaining the situation, he asked: "There are such big mistakes in Tian Zheng, why don't you tell me?"
Chen Maosheng was also surprised and explained: "At the beginning of the land distribution, everyone was very happy and did not say it was not conducive to marriage. After that, I was transferred to the General Military Mansion. I didn't know much about the following things, and no one reported this.
situation."
Zhao Han had no solution for a while and ordered: "Inform the missionary group and the farmers' association immediately and ask them to collect more opinions from farmers to see how to solve this problem."
This is a big loophole. The family that raises a daughter will suffer a loss and may not want the daughter to get married because the daughter will take away the land.
The land administration of New China is based on the village group as a unit, and the total amount is divided equally among the villagers. The land is taken back by the deceased, and the land is immediately divided among the newborns.
But Zhao Han can't do this!
The land equalization system of the Sui and Tang Dynasties has left lessons learned from the past. With the control of the grassroots in ancient times, it was impossible to take back the land of the deceased, which was almost equivalent to redistributing the land every year. During the Sui and Tang Dynasties, public land was also redistributed to farmers every year, and the grassroots
In order to save trouble, the officials simply maintained the status quo every year. As a result, the deceased's fields could not be recovered, and the newly grown Ding's fields could not be divided. In the end, the Tang Dynasty's finances collapsed.
The peasant association is only a transitional product and does not have any official positions. Once it is given official positions, it will inevitably lead to corruption, and it will overlap with the effectiveness of village and town institutions. The government cannot provide so much salary. But if it is not given official positions, as time goes by, the cadres of the peasant association will
The enthusiasm has also faded.
Therefore, sooner or later, the peasant association will be abolished, or it will die naturally, and all village affairs will ultimately belong to the village chief.
What Zhao Han considered at the time was that instead of being riddled with corruption in allocating land in the future, it would be better to take advantage of his full control and directly allocate the land to farmers for private property.
In this way, it is guaranteed that each farmer has a few acres of land, and even if he has a few more children, he can still survive. After the territory expands, the excess population will be moved to the war-torn areas in the north.
In this way, rural stability can be achieved for decades, and when the time comes, land conflicts will be transferred overseas step by step.
Really, if a land policy can be implemented smoothly and ensure rural stability for decades, it is considered a very powerful policy.
From ancient times to the present, no political power has been able to rely solely on agriculture to maintain land administration.
As New China developed into the 21st century, it also used industry to eliminate land conflicts. Due to the increasing population, many newborns in rural areas can no longer divide their land.
The same cannot be said for industry in the seventeenth century. The early industrial revolution not only failed to alleviate land conflicts, but also accelerated land annexation!
There was so much land in North America at first, but after the rise of the industrial revolution, a large number of farmers were left without land to cultivate, because capital annexed land too quickly. The only way to divert conflicts was through continuous expansion and seizing Indian territory.
The same is true in Britain. Before the Glorious Revolution, the king was opposed to the enclosure movement because it was not conducive to the king's collection of agricultural taxes.
It was the great development of British industry that led to the crazy annexation of land by capitalists. If the king was an eyesore, he would overthrow the king, so the land enclosure movement intensified. If this were done in China, the farmers would have rebelled long ago. Of course, the British farmers also rebelled, but the population size is too large
Small, easily suppressed by nobles.
The land enclosure movement caused a large number of landless peasants to flock to the cities to work and make a living. The scale of British industry could not cope with it, so it could only enact strict laws, and anyone who stole a piece of bread could be exiled to Australia. In this way, the excess urban population was thrown overseas
Self-destruction can not only reduce local security pressure, but also increase the population of overseas colonies.
As for how many innocent civilians died as a result of the enclosure movement and the exile policy, that is not a question that capitalists need to consider.
All I can say is that it was a history of blood and tears.
Zhao Han also wants to develop industry. He can imagine that after the capitalists make money, they will definitely spend a lot of money to buy land. Therefore, he wants to divide the land in advance and prohibit land sales. Even if the land is rewarded for merit, there must be an upper limit.
Capped private lands are not valid.
Forcing capitalists to explore overseas!
But the problem we are encountering now is simply ridiculous. It turns out that women marry, resulting in disputes over land ownership.
Zhao Han used all his strength to collect various opinions and found that this problem... had no solution.
Marriage can only be carried out in exchange for land. If there is no daughter in the family, it will be difficult for the son to get a wife. If he wants to get a wife, he can just promise not to give up his wife's land. Otherwise, the woman's family will never allow their daughter to marry off in order to protect the land.
Zhao Han held several meetings and the final decision was absurd: no intervention.
If you don't have a daughter in your family and you still want to marry your son, you have to agree to keep the woman's property in her parents' home without bringing her over.
No policy is perfect. As long as there are no major problems, just make do with it.
…
Bailuzhou Academy.
More than four hundred officials, clerks and scholars crowded together to listen to Zhao Han's lecture. In front of everyone was a pamphlet written by Zhao Hangang.
"The Theory of Family, Country and World"!
Zhao Han stood on the podium, fearing that the students in the back row could not hear clearly, so he simply held up a paper loudspeaker to lecture.
"In the pre-Qin period, the land ruled by the Emperor of Zhou was the world. The land distributed to the princes was the country. The land distributed to the scholar-bureaucrats was the family."
"In today's world, the land passed down by our ancestors is the world, and the land we lay down is also the world. What is a country? The land ruled by the emperor is a country, such as our Ming Dynasty! As for the family, your family, my family, big or small
Countless homes!”
Although the Ming Emperor still has the title of Emperor, the official term "Ming Kingdom" has long been used.
These concepts are easily accepted.
"Changing one's surname to another name is called the subjugation of the country. Being full of benevolence and righteousness, but leading beasts to eat people and people eating each other is called the subjugation of the world. The subjugation of a country is not terrible. If the Ming Dynasty is destroyed, it is called the subjugation of a country. You and I can rebuild a new country.
It is terrible to destroy the world, and no one, no matter the common people or the gentry, can escape!"
"The country of Ming Dynasty is composed of thousands of families."
"Thousands of families pay taxes to the court to maintain the existence of this country."
"As a country and as a court, what should the Ming Dynasty do? It should use the taxes paid by the common people to support both the civil and military teams."
"Civil officials and officials maintain the operation of the country. They spread education, encourage farmers and mulberry trees, build water conservancy projects, build bridges and pave roads, and eradicate violence. Military attachés and soldiers maintain the stability of the country. They must eliminate bandits internally and resist foreigners externally."
"What's the situation now?"
"Most of the civil servants and officials are corrupt officials. Water conservancy projects are no longer repaired, and relief for the people is not provided in years of great disaster. Instead of eradicating violence and ensuring peace, they are exploiting the people wantonly."
"The military attachés and soldiers will have no courage, and the soldiers will have no fighting spirit. They will not be able to eliminate bandits internally, and they will suffer repeated defeats externally, causing the world to be devastated."
"The reason why I raised an army to rebel is that the Ming Dynasty no longer looks like a national court."
"..."
Pang Chunlai, Li Banghua, Song Yingxing, Tian Younian, Wang Diaoding and others were said to be suddenly enlightened, especially about the subjugation of the country and the subjugation of the world.
"Changing one's surname to another name is called the country's subjugation. Being full of benevolence and righteousness, but leading animals to eat people and people eating each other is called the subjugation of the world." This sentence came from Gu Yanwu. It has not been published yet, which is enough for scholars to understand the truth.
It can also provide a very strong theoretical basis for Zhao Han's rebellion.
Zhao Han continued:
"Why did the Ming Dynasty fall to this point?"
"Official administration, education, and morality are not the key. In the time of Taizu, official administration was also corrupt because it originated from the officials of the Mongolian and Yuan Dynasties. But why could it prosper at that time? It was all because of the fiscal restraint of the imperial court."
"I can divide taxation in a country into two types, direct taxation and indirect taxation."
"Direct taxes are taxes paid on a per capita basis or on land. Indirect taxes, such as door stall taxes, banknote tariffs, etc. If the taxes are heavy, the goods will be sold at a high price. Anyway, the merchants will not lose money and can be passed on to the people."
“If a country wants to maintain financial stability, direct taxation must be stable.”
"In today's world, direct taxation has been destroyed. First of all, it is the land. A small group of people occupy the vast majority of the land. They can avoid tax, they can evade tax, and even if they cannot evade it, they can pass it on to tenants, turning direct taxation into indirect taxation.
.”
"The second is the poll tax. Since the one-whip law was corrupted, the poll tax has been collected completely indiscriminately. A large number of common people took shelter from the gentry and hid their population to escape the poll tax. This resulted in a small number of common people bearing the poll tax of the entire country!"
"The imperial court's finances are unstable, the people are miserable, and all their wealth has been taken away by those wealthy families."
"If the imperial court doesn't have enough tax revenue, it won't be able to raise troops. If the soldiers don't have enough to eat, how can they fight against the Tatars? The more they can't defeat the Tatars, the more they will have to levy and raise troops."
"The imperial court imposes excessive taxes and the people cannot survive, so they will rise up in rebellion. The northwest bandits who were the first to rebel were all forced to rise up. This forced the imperial court to send troops to suppress the rebellion. The more troops it used, the more its finances were exhausted, and the more unlimited it became.
The excessive expropriation and extortion of taxes aroused more people to rebel."
"Drink poison to quench thirsty ears!"
"So, we have reached this situation."
"Those who cause chaos in the country are not only the emperor, not only the clan, and not only corrupt officials. All the gentry and gentry in the world are to blame!"
"Why should I divide the fields? Because if I don't divide the fields, not only will the country be destroyed, but the world will be destroyed, and thousands of families will be destroyed! Look, where the northwest bandits have passed, which big family can save their lives? It's Yichun. , Yongxin counties are also killing landlords for rebellion. If you don’t believe it, go to Yongxin County and see for yourself!”
"Gentlemen here, do you want me to divide the fields? Or do you want the whole world to rebel and take away all your wealth and lives?"
"The family, the country, and the world are actually one. If everyone only cares about the family and his own family, the country will perish forever, and eventually the world will perish. If the world perishes, the small furniture will be destroyed, and the family will not survive!"
"..."
Pang Chunlai, Li Banghua, and Song Yingxing thought they had a thorough understanding of the situation in the Ming Dynasty.
But Zhao Han's views on direct taxation and indirect taxation were refreshing to them, and their previously vague views were summarized theoretically.
Li Banghua sighed: "For my family, my country and the world, I can still say this, which is really enlightening!"
Pang Chunlai turned to Wang Diaoding and said: "Bo He has outstanding literary talent. He can polish this article and distribute it in Jiujiang and Nanchang cities."