Yan Song's first assistant, Xu Jie's second assistant, Zhang Juzheng, Gao Gong, and Li Chunfang's cabinet members.
Among them, Yan Song, the chief assistant, is now an independent man, and his reputation in official circles has completely become bad.
It was unanimously spurned by the previous Yan Party and Qingliu Party.
But he was still supported by Zhu Yuanzhang, so the first assistant was very happy.
Zhang Juzheng and Gao Gong below are reformists. After two years of running in, they have already developed a tacit political understanding with Zhu Yuanzhang.
The remaining Li Chunfang and Xu Jie are from the south, and their families have thousands of acres of mulberry fields.
Of course, it is not entirely true to say that they colluded with the Japanese pirates.
They, the big farmers, only have control over raw silk.
According to Chen Hong's investigation, there are eight families in total, led by the Xu family, and these eight families have formed a de facto alliance.
Raw silk is sold at a unified price and sold at a unified price.
Therefore, they have the bargaining power on silk.
They just sell the raw silk to the merchants on the southeast coast at a price higher than the market price. Of course, they know very well that after these merchants weave the raw silk into silk, they will definitely smuggle it.
But this has nothing to do with them.
As a wealthy family with a long history of farming and studying, there were also high-ranking officials in the court, but they did not bother to do business as merchants.
They only sell raw silk and influence the direction of the imperial government at the appropriate time.
But they have always been the biggest beneficiaries of this smuggling chain.
After two years of investigation by Chen Hong, it was found that in the entire silk smuggling network, the big mulberry farmers led by the Xu family were actually the most profitable. They earned almost 60% of the profits in this profit chain, and the remaining 30% were from coastal areas.
The last percent of maritime merchants were the pirate groups who transported silk to Japan, Southeast Asia and other countries.
Those who really colluded with the Japanese pirates were these maritime merchants who were between the pirates and the big families in the southeast.
Therefore, even if Chen Hong's case of collaborating with Japanese pirates was investigated again, the Xu family would not be found.
Of course, life is not easy for these big families in the southeast now. Chang Yuchun's Royal Navy fleet has blocked the southeast coast and completely blocked sea trade.
The silk of these big families cannot be smuggled and can only be sold domestically.
But the country cannot digest so much silk, so the price can only be reduced, and it is reduced again and again.
In the early Jiajing years when the smuggling trade was at its peak, the price of a piece of silk had soared to ten taels of silver, but now it has been cut down to thirty taels.
At this price, it is no longer possible to make money by growing food.
Even so, those large households in the southeast still had countless amounts of silk that they could not sell.
But Xu Jie and others had nothing to do about it. There is a saying that politics is the continuation of military affairs. The moment the Japanese pirates were eliminated along the southeast coast, these big families on the southeast coast had lost their most important bargaining chip.
He has absolutely no qualifications to bargain with the current Saint.
what to do?
You can only compromise.
So a very interesting phenomenon can be seen in the court in the past two years.
The open-sea advocates of ten years ago turned into conservatives and suggested that the imperial court should continue to close the treaty ports and first squeeze out the large mulberry farmers on the southeast coast.
However, those who were originally conservatives have now become the most radical proponents of opening up the sea. Their rhetoric is so fierce that it seems that the Ming Dynasty will perish if it does not open up the sea.
In fact, Zhu Yuanzhang understood that they were really anxious.
If the Ming Navy on the southeast coast does not lift the blockade and allow merchants to trade, all their mulberry fields will be destroyed and replaced with food.
If you really do this, the losses will be huge.
Therefore, they would rather pay taxes to the court than open channels to sell these silks to other countries.
Zhu Yuanzhang actually did not want to kill them all. After all, in addition to these large mulberry farmers on the southeast coast, there were more small mulberry farmers.
If the price of silk really continues to drop for a few years, although those big families will be hurt, it is the farmers who will really suffer the disaster.
This is what Zhu Yuanzhang did not want to see.
So in the end, after several days of intense discussions at the imperial meeting, he finally relented and agreed to Xu Jie's proposal to open up treaty ports along the coast.
Then this policy was implemented at an extremely fast speed without any constraints or causing any disturbances.
"Taizu, this is amazing. From Hongzhi to Zhengde and then to Jiajing, the court had countless debates on whether to open the sea, but none of them went as smoothly as this time, and it was settled directly."
"I really don't understand, why is this?" In the Xiyuan, Emperor Jiajing looked at the memorial sent from the southeast with a mysterious face.
According to the report from Jin Yiwei over there, two months after the sea was opened, the tax revenue at each port reached 3.8 million taels.
You know, it's only been two months.
If this continues, wouldn't it be possible to collect 20 million taels of tax a year?
This is already five times the tax revenue of the entire Ming Dynasty last year.
"Because we have a powerful navy and a sword in our hands, no one dares to show their teeth to us." Zhu Yuanzhang said solemnly.
"Like you, if you have some money, you build palaces and temples and use them for enjoyment. Of course, those civil servants dare to do it in front of you."
"Now you want Yan Song and Xu Jie to try another trick on us?"
"If we say we want to kill his whole family, then we will kill his whole family."
"Taizu is my idol."
"I am so impressed that I fell to the ground." Emperor Jiajing said with a look of reverence.
"Okay, stop flattering and ask Yan Song and the others to come. We have something big to announce." Zhu Yuanzhang said.
"Okay, I will make arrangements now!"
Emperor Jiajing smiled happily when he heard this, and immediately ran to deliver the order.
Now he is quite proficient in the eunuch's work. He handles things without leakage and gets things done quickly, which makes Lu Fang, Huang Jin and others quite resentful.
Emperor Jiajing took away all their jobs, and they faced an extremely serious unemployment crisis.
As soon as Emperor Jiajing left, Zhu Yuanzhang waved his hand, and a huge portal suddenly appeared in front of him.
"Zhu Biao, Zhu Di, Li Shanchang, Xu Da, Chang Yuchun, Liu Ji and a large number of civil servants and generals from the early Ming Dynasty came out from the rear.
"Father!"
"Your Majesty!" Everyone saluted respectfully.
Zhu Yuanzhang waved his hand and asked everyone to stand up and said with a smile: "I asked you to come to meet these civil servants and generals of the Jiajing Dynasty. We may work together in the future. You can get to know each other later."
Everyone had different feelings when they heard this.
Zhu Biao didn't care, he had been here many times.
Zhu Di has never been here, but he has been thinking about coming here for a long time.
Emperor Jiajing, an unworthy descendant, changed his temple name from Emperor Taizong to Ming Chengzu, and listed him and Zhu Yuanzhang as the second ancestor.
Because of this incident, Zhu Di was often beaten by Zhu Yuanzhang. As he got older, Zhu Yuanzhang stopped beating him, but the temple title of Ming Chengzu still made him extremely unhappy.
How dare he stand side by side with his father!
Therefore, he had sworn long ago that if he could reach the Jiajing Dynasty, he would catch this unscrupulous descendant and beat him up.
Now is clearly the time for wish fulfillment.
Apart from Zhu Biao and Zhu Di, Xu Da was also a little uncomfortable.
His unscrupulous descendants were also active in the Ming Dynasty, and they were still members of a two-state clan.
If we add the Zhongshan Palace in the early Ming Dynasty, we will have one king and two princes!
This made him quite terrified deep inside.
With his cautious character, how could he bear such a great honor?
Soon, the cabinet members headed by Yan Song, as well as senior officials such as Hai Rui and Hu Zongxian were summoned to Xiyuan.
The moment they stepped into Xiyuan, they noticed that this place was different from the past.
The security became even tighter.
Countless imposing Jin Yiwei stood almost three steps to one post, and five steps to one guard, all silently watching their group.
Yan Song and others are all great scholars in the world, and their talents are running in their eyes. They soon saw the earth-shattering evil aura from these people.
There is no doubt that these people were killed from among the dead.
"When did the imperial court gain so many powerful warriors?" Xu Jie had some bad premonitions in his heart.
Even more surprised than these great scholars in the world were Yu Dayou, Qi Jiguang, Wang Chonggu and other military generals.
They clearly felt that their evil spirits were suppressed by these people.
You must know that they are one of the few famous generals in the Jiajing Dynasty who have been baptized by blood and fire. Even they were suppressed. What are the backgrounds of these people?
Everyone speeded up their pace unconsciously, knowing very well that the answers to these questions lay in the hall in front of them.
They even vaguely felt that today would be the moment that changed the entire political situation of the Ming Dynasty.
Soon, they were led to the meeting hall by the eunuch who led the way.
What surprised them even more was that there were many people standing in the hall at this moment, and the most important thing was that Emperor Jiajing, who was originally sitting at the top, had been replaced by a middle-aged man who looked extremely familiar.
Emperor Jiajing was standing next to this person obediently, with a flattering look on his face.
"This...!" Many great scholars have been working hard in the officialdom for decades, and have long been trained to the point where they can remain calm even if the mountain collapses in front of them, but now their expressions have really changed.
"What does this mean?"
"Usurping the throne?" This frightening word immediately came to everyone's mind.
Among them, the one who responded the most was Hai Rui.
But before he could speak, Zhu Yuanzhang directly waved his hand and suppressed the Confucianism and Taoism talents of all the great Confucians with the imperial protective dragon energy.
"Don't panic, we are Zhu Yuanzhang!"
"There was unavoidable turmoil in the government before. I have always treated you as my unworthy descendant."
"But now that many things in the Ming Dynasty have been straightened out, we think it's time to talk to you openly and honestly." Zhu Yuanzhang looked around the crowd and spoke slowly.
"Taizu...?"
"This is absolutely ridiculous."
"Taizu has been dead for a hundred years." Hai Rui was the first to speak. Even without the support of his talent, his voice was still deafening.
"There are so many wonderful things in the world, why is Mr. Hai so arbitrary?"
"If Emperor Hongwu hadn't been in power, who do you think would dare to reuse someone like you? How would the Ming Dynasty have such a good situation now?"
Liu Ji smiled and spoke with a gentle voice, but he immediately suppressed Hai Rui.
"How to prove it?" Hai Rui was silent for a moment and then spoke again.
"No need to prove it!"
"We are Zhu Yuanzhang, we don't need to prove it to anyone."
Zhu Yuanzhang stood up directly and looked down at all the people in the Jiajing Dynasty who were selected by him and qualified to enter the palace.
"We didn't ask you to come here today to prove anything to you. We asked you to do things for us to reform the Ming Dynasty in this plane."
"If you want to prove something, you can leave yourself to find it. If you want to do something, just stand up for us. I will teach you how to do it next."