Chapter 1503. Catch them all in one fell swoop (10).
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Ever since Zhu Hejian proposed to hold this public debate, the Jin gentry forces thought that they had a chance to win, and developed a mentality of underestimating the enemy. They were quickly distracted by the repeated changes in the situation in Nanjing, so they did not
After careful preparation, even the list of five people to appear in the debate was temporarily determined last night.
After all, the Jin gentry forces believed that they had more than ten contemporary scholars and had closer relations with all walks of life in Nanjing. They could be said to respond to a hundred requests, so they had no idea that they would lose this debate.
But the Huangzhuang forces were completely different. Although they were distracted by various changes in the situation in Nanjing, and once mistakenly thought that the debate would be postponed, Zhu Hejian was already prepared when he mentioned the matter.
A complete package and a complete strategy.
The five representatives selected by the Huangzhuang forces were conceived from the beginning. They each have their own responsibilities and clear tasks.
Yang Youliang, an old tenant farmer, is responsible for seizing the initiative and changing public opinion; Jiang Dawei, the eunuch of the Imperial Palace, is responsible for supporting and emboldening the enemy; Xu Sanjun, a famous litigator, is responsible for responding tactfully and messing around.
As for Shi Baijin, a small businessman who is attached to the power of Huangzhuang, and Guo Sizong, the aide in charge of accounts in the Nanjing eunuch's mansion, they also have clear tasks, which is to list various data and facts and settle accounts in public!
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At this time, under Jiang Dawei's signal, Guo Sizong took the lead to stand up and said: "This is ridiculous! It seems that the imperial village does not have to pay taxes to the court, but most of the grain produced still has to be turned over to the capital.
The internal funds attributed to His Majesty, taking the Imperial Mansion under Jiang Guanzhuang as an example, turned over 8,000 stones of rice and grain and 7,000 taels of silver to His Majesty’s internal funds last year alone!
After these money and grains are collected into His Majesty's internal funds, they are not exclusively enjoyed by the Heavenly Family. Your Majesty will not only use these rice grains to reward his subjects, but will also subsidize them when the national treasury is empty. Similar situations abound! Therefore, the tenants went to Huangzhuang.
After that, he seemed to have avoided government taxes, but he still made great contributions to the country and the country!
On the contrary, the situation of various Jin gentry families in Jiangnan is completely different! Take the Wang family as an example, they own 3,000 hectares of fertile land in Nanjing and Suzhou alone, which is much larger than the Huangzhuang under Jiangguanzhuang. Tenants attached to the Wang family,
There are four to five thousand long-term workers and domestic slaves, but the taxes paid to the court last year were only three thousand shi of brown rice!"
As Guo Sizong finished speaking, Wang Jiahe's expression changed drastically again.
Wang Jiahe didn't understand why the Huangzhuang forces specifically targeted the Wang family. First, they used Yang Youliang to publicly accuse the Wang family of bullying tenants. Now they listed in detail the size of the Wang family's land and the amount of taxes paid, publicly accusing the Wang family of concealing their land property and evading taxes.
of guilt.
However, Wang Jiahe still did not dare to admit such accusations, and stood up angrily again: "That's nonsense! The Wang family is in Nanjing, and the property in Suzhou is as high as 3,000 hectares? As the head of the Wang family, why don't I know anything about it? It's just a bloody rant! I
The total property of the Wang family is only 800 yuan, and there are as many as 21 people in the Wang family who have the title of civil servant or above, and there are as many as seven people who have been awarded by the imperial court. According to the imperial court's decree, most of the land can be exempted from payment.
Grain tax, so my Wang family paid three thousand dan in grain tax last year, out of the desire to serve the court, we took the initiative to pay more!"
Guo Sizong took his time and took out a thick book, flipping through it and reminding him: "In Shanshui Township in the northern suburbs of Nanjing, the Wang family owns 85 acres of land; in Dongguan Village in the eastern suburbs of Nanjing, the Wang family owns land
Sixty hectares; and Sanhe Village to the west of Suzhou, almost all the fertile land in the territory belongs to the Wang family, about 200 hectares... These fields combined definitely exceed 3,000 hectares. If the Wang family insists that
Some of these properties do not belong to the Wang family, and that villain has more evidence here that can prove the facts at any time."
As Guo Sizong continued to list, the Wang family's eyes grew wider and wider, and a hint of panic appeared in their expressions.
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It is not uncommon for the Jin gentry to conceal their land properties and evade taxes, but the fact that the Huangzhuang forces knew so much about the distribution location and specific scale of the Wang family's property made Wang Jiahe shudder.
Not only Wang Jiahe felt shuddering at this time, but the entire Jin gentry forces were once again in chaos. He never expected that the Huangzhuang forces would dare to directly burst into the hornet's nest and expose in public the open secret of the Jin gentry forces' concealment of property!
Aren't the Huangzhuang forces afraid of completely intensifying the relationship between the Jiangnan Jin gentry and the central court, and making the situation completely deteriorate out of control?
The booklet Guo Sizong took out was extremely thick, and it obviously recorded a lot of content, and the content related to the Wang family's property only occupied seven or eight pages.
Therefore, does this book also record the real property status of other Jin gentry families?
The true size of the land owned by each Jin gentry family is one of the absolute secrets of the major Jin gentry families. Where did the Huangzhuang forces collect such detailed data?
Thinking of this, the expressions of the other four debate representatives of the Jin gentry force also changed slightly.
But before the Jin gentry forces could react, Shi Baijin, a small businessman who was attached to the Huangzhuang forces, also stood up. He also insisted on clinging to the Wang family. He also took out a thick booklet and listed in detail the Wang family's locations in Nanjing and Suzhou.
The various industries in the city, how many grain stores, how many shops there are, which trading houses are shareholders, etc.
Under the continuous enumeration by Guo Sizong and Shi Baijin, the wise men from all walks of life who were watching and witnessing were also shocked in their hearts.
Although everyone has long heard that the Wang family has strong financial resources and is extremely wealthy, they never expected that the specific assets of the Wang family are so amazing. It is not an exaggeration to say that the Wang family is as rich as the country. It has far exceeded the limit of ordinary people's imagination.
The Wang family alone has such amazing wealth, what about the other Jin gentry who are as famous as the Wang family?
How much land is there in Jiangnan? How much will be left after being divided and annexed by these wealthy gentry families?
The land annexation in Jiangnan has reached such a shocking level?
The wise men and women from all walks of life in Nanjing who were present were all very aware that the land annexation phenomenon in Jiangnan was very hard to come back. However, after they heard the various figures listed in detail by the Huangzhuang forces, they were shocked to find that the situation was far more serious than expected.
In shock, people from all walks of life in Nanjing either out of hatred for the rich, out of concern for the country and the people, or thought of the fact that they had been oppressed by the Jin gentry forces, and how they viewed this debate.
, also quietly changed.
Prior to this, the general mentality of people from all walks of life in Nanjing was that "the eunuchs of the imperial village pretended to be powerful and oppressed the virtuous, while the gentry forces were not afraid of the imperial power and spoke uprightly. Therefore, they should support the gentry forces and abolish a large number of imperial estates to avoid the imperial power competing for profits with the people."
However, after Yang Youliang, Guo Sizong, and Shi Baijin successively appeared and gave their own explanations, their mentality has changed to "both the imperial and gentry forces are the cowards of the country, and no one can take advantage of them."
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In fact, under the plan of the seventh prince Zhu Hejian, the Huangzhuang forces have been specifically targeting the Wang family. The reason is also very simple. It is because the Wang family is good at raising children, has many people, and is large in scale, so it is easiest to catch people.
At the same time, the Wang family has been using marriage alliances with other wealthy gentry families for many years. Their mutual interests are intricately intertwined. It can be said that one is prosperous and the other suffers. Therefore, after the Huangzhuang forces concentrated their firepower to attack the Wang family, they can also use the rest of the
Several wealthy Jin gentry families dragged them into the water together to prevent the Jin gentry forces from abandoning their vehicles to protect the commander-in-chief, forcing the Jin gentry forces to stand down and defend the Wang family.
In addition, the Huangzhuang forces were well prepared and had collected a large amount of conclusive evidence of various evil deeds of the Wang family. Therefore, when the Jin gentry forces came to defend the Wang family, they could only tell lies with open eyes and forcefully argue.
In this way, under the watch of all walks of life in Nanjing, the Jin gentry forces can only put on a shameful and clumsy performance, which will further damage the favorability and popularity of the Jin gentry forces.
As a conspirator, Zhu Hejian is well versed in the changes in people's hearts, is good at manipulating situations, and can always keenly seize every opportunity. Therefore, this debate has always followed Zhu Hejian's preset rhythm from the beginning.
As for the contemporary scholars and debate representatives arranged by the Jin gentry forces, their reactions did not go beyond Zhu Hejian's pre-deduction. After seeing that the Wang family was deliberately targeted, they had already guessed that the Huangzhuang forces were prepared.
, stepping forward to defend the Wang family under such circumstances must be a thankless task, but due to the in-law relationship between their respective families and the Wang family, they can only bite the bullet and speak out to defend them.
It's a pity that these contemporary great scholars are obviously path dependent. Their debate routines are three-fold. First, they use various sage remarks to seize the moral high ground, and then they accuse the other party of violating the rules.
The three cardinal guides and five constant principles, in the end, is to use one's own connections and influence to achieve the effect of a room full of applause and a response from a hundred people.
After these three moves, the great Confucianists can naturally show their sage in front of others and proudly declare their victory.
But this time the situation is completely different.
After Yang Youliang, Guo Sizong, and Shi Baijin came forward to give their personal accounts, no matter how many saintly remarks the Jin gentry forces used, they could not cover up their evil deeds of oppressing the people, plundering, and evading taxes.
There were even many times when several contemporary great scholars in the Jin gentry group had difficulty even using the trick of "sages have clouds" because they really could not think of any saint who supported the Jin gentry in oppressing the people, annexing land, and evading taxes.
Often I would be red-faced and speechless, but in the end I would choose to publicly misinterpret the saint's words, which in turn caused more criticism.
As for those people from all walks of life in Nanjing who were watching on the scene, after seeing the clumsy performance of the Jin gentry forces with their strong arguments, their favorable impression of the Jin gentry forces dropped sharply, and they turned to a stand of watching with cold eyes and not helping each other. Therefore, even if these contemporary scholars are
No matter how small your words may be, or your speeches may be impassioned, there will still be very few responders, and there may even be a cold reception.
As a result, several great scholars from the Jin gentry forces not only lost their moral superiority, but also lost the support of public opinion. Under the pressure of the Huangzhuang forces who continued to come up with conclusive figures, they soon became clumsy.
The debate fell behind.
As the moderator of this public debate, Zhu Hejian saw that his plan went extremely smoothly, with the Huangzhuang forces gaining the upper hand and the Jingentry forces retreating steadily. At first, he felt proud, thinking that he had won this round.
Subconsciously, Zhu Hejian raised his eyes to secretly observe the changes in Zhou Shangjing's expression, hoping to find some embarrassment and anxiety on Zhou Shangjing's old face, but was surprised to find that Zhou Shangjing was still the old god, taking his time, as if he was not worried about the defeat and embarrassment of the Jin gentry forces at all.
, I was even in the mood to comment and chat with a few people around me.
Seeing Zhou Shangjing's performance, Zhu Hejian couldn't help but be stunned.
The next moment, Zhu Hejian suddenly thought of something, and his expression changed slightly uncontrollably.
"What's wrong, I only focused on competing with the Jin gentry forces, and actually ignored the most critical point! Zhou Shangjing wants to catch them all! He, his ambition and courage are so great?"
Thinking of this, Zhu Hejian quickly stood up and wanted to publicly defend the Jin gentry forces and stop the aggressiveness of the Huangzhuang forces.
But at this moment, among the five representatives of the Jin gentry forces who appeared in the debate, Song Jicheng, the direct grandson of the Song family who had always been the most low-key, stood up before Zhu Hejian and said loudly: "Seniors and sages,
Please listen to what I have to say, junior!"
After attracting everyone's attention, Song Jicheng turned to look at Zhu Hejian. A sneer seemed to flash across his expression, but his tone was unprecedentedly humble: "Since the beginning of this debate, the Huangzhuang forces have been accusing me of bullying the Jiangnan gentry.
Common people, annexing land, evading taxes... repeatedly throwing dirty water, it can be said that it is too much to bully others! Logically speaking, at this time, we, the Jin gentry, should not only prove our innocence, but also retaliate with an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, also publicly
List the various evil deeds of the Huangzhuang forces... But we Jin gentry have never done this. Instead, we endure it again and again, and keep giving in... Your Highness, the Seventh Prince, why do you think we Jin gentry deliberately tolerate it? "
Good guy, in just a few sentences, Song Jicheng glossed over and distorted all the poor performances of the other four debate representatives of the Jin gentry forces, and said that they were deliberately tolerant.
But for Zhu Hejian, only the last sentence of Song Jicheng's statement had real lethality - why did the Jin gentry deliberately tolerate it?
The next moment, Song Jicheng sighed and raised his voice: "Because... we Jin gentry have to take into account the overall situation! After all, Huangzhuang is a royal property and is related to the prestige of the Tianjia. The most we Jin gentry can do is blame Huangzhuang and Jin gentry for competing for tenants.
, water sources, fertile farmland, but how can we publicly expose the various evil deeds of various Huangzhuang, thereby damaging the reputation of Tianjia? If we Jin Shen and Huangzhuang keep accusing each other and exposing each other, no one will benefit in the end.
But it will definitely make Chao Gang unstable and the people dissatisfied! When these mutual accusations fall into the ears of the people, they will only make them think that the whole government is full of silverfish... This is the real reason why we, the gentry, have been tolerant!"
Hearing Song Jicheng's confession, Zhu Hejian's face turned slightly pale.
But Song Jicheng's performance is still not over.
The next moment, Song Jicheng made another more lethal suggestion.