Chapter Thirty-eight: East Pavilion Discussion (2)
After listening to Cai Bian's words, Cao Duo's first thought was not to think about the pros and cons of adding a general to each county, but to think about such a major matter, why didn't the officials attend the meeting in person to discuss it with everyone?
In the past, he liked to discuss these hesitant issues with the ministers, express their own opinions, and even call it "brainstorming."
Why did he just ask Dazai Cai Bian to lead everyone to discuss this this time? What exactly does the official family mean?
As an acquaintance of Zhao Si and always a close minister, Cao Duo thought about it for a while and suddenly thought of something.
Could it be that the officials thought that their presence could easily affect everyone's thoughts. In the past, everyone could indeed speak freely and express their opinions. But with the destruction of Xia, Ping Liao and Dali, the country became increasingly prosperous, and the power of the officials became more and more powerful.
Zhang Dun, Su Che, Fan Chunli, Han Zhongyan, Xu Jiang and other senior ministers passed away and retired one after another. With the departure of these senior ministers who first entered the officialdom during the reign of Emperor Renzong and experienced the ups and downs of several dynasties, the court dared to speak out against the officials.
There are fewer and fewer ministers in the family. Many ministers, including myself, first consider the government's attitude towards this matter, and then make decisions based on this.
The officials should be aware of this, so they try not to attend the Dongge meeting in person, allowing the ministers to express their opinions as much as possible without any scruples.
Most of the other pavilion elders also figured out the mystery. After waiting for half a quarter of an hour, someone spoke.
"Some people think that a Fang Bo should be established to take charge of county affairs. As we all know, the territory of the Song Dynasty is vast, surpassing the Han and Tang Dynasties, and there are more than 20 counties in the hinterland. Each county has several prefectures and counties, with millions of people. In the Central Plains,
The southeast is fine, with flat terrain, dense river network, and convenient transportation. However, there are still many counties with complex terrain and inconvenient transportation."
The first person to speak was Zhang Shuye.
"I have been a local official and know the local situation, which is complicated and complicated. Mountains and floods, roaring in the mountains and forests... all kinds of emergencies are happening one after another. At this time, someone needs to make a decisive decision. But now each county and three departments are performing their duties.
, it is a good thing that responsibilities are clearly defined. But once an accident occurs, there may be cases of mutual blame. If this is the case, I am worried that the situation will spread and get out of hand."
The clock in the meeting hall ticked, like some kind of musical instrument beating the rhythm, urging a certain character to come on stage quickly.
After a few minutes of silence, Fan Chunchun spoke.
"Each county is divided into three departments, each performing its own duties. At first, everyone did not agree with it. They felt that it was too complicated and detailed, and it was suspected of burdening the people. However, after actual implementation, we discovered that the key to supervising officials lies in clear responsibilities. What is a yamen?
What should be done, what positions should be performed, and what responsibilities should be fulfilled. It should be clear and clear. Only then can we find the responsible yamen and the specific person responsible for the problem, instead of like before, searching here and there, and finally settling the matter."
"The most important point is that some places are remote. If one person is appointed to be in charge of county affairs, and all the power of the three divisions is taken over by him, there may be unforeseen things... So I think it is a good idea to separate the three divisions.
A good policy should be continued unchanged."
The situation is obvious. Zhang Shuye is on the right side and supports the establishment of a new member to be in charge of county affairs and to oversee the three divisions. The reason is that local affairs are complicated and there should be senior officials in charge with the power to deal with emergencies in order to deal with various emergencies.
event.
Fan Chun was on the opposite side. His reason was that if a local official took charge of the third division and had the power to act expediently, it would easily lead to a situation where the tail was too big to lose.
Although the two people spoke in a smooth manner, everyone present understood the other meaning behind their words.
What Zhang Shuye is worried about is that the New Deal has entered the "deep water zone" and may cause local crises.
Among the many measures taken before the New Deal, one was to work hard to make a big pie so that everyone would have a share and get more; the other was to severely crack down on many bad practices in tax collection and prevent the people from paying ten cents of tax, so the court only received four cents.
Corrupt officials and related personnel are divided into six points.
Various measures are taken to avoid infringing on the interests of civil servants, aristocratic families and other interest groups as much as possible, and at the same time, they are making a big pie, so that their share is larger than before.
It is precisely because of these measures that although there were turbulences in the New Deal in the third year of Yuan Fu, there were no major setbacks. In a stable environment, the national power of the Song Dynasty was rapidly enhanced, which could then support the extermination of Xia, the pacification of Liao and the conquest of Dali.
of many wars.
Now, the ministers who pushed for the New Deal all know that it is indeed time to go further.
First of all, the official family holds the power of the three great achievements, and no force in the world dares to challenge it. Secondly, Xixia and Northern Liao have been destroyed, and the Song Dynasty has no worries about external troubles. Even if there are some internal chaos, there is no need to worry about internal and external collusion.
Therefore, since the eleventh year of the Apocalypse, when Cai Bian took office with the new cabinet, the New Deal began to change the method of distribution of bread. Although in the early stage, it was just a warm and cautious approach, but the relevant interest groups are not fools, and sooner or later they will notice it.
, the hands of the New Deal began to take money out of their pockets - asking them to pay less is equivalent to taking money out of their pockets.
The abolition of job fields is a very critical and tentative step.
In this case, it is very likely that big troubles will occur in the local area - the last New Deal continued Wang Jinggong's new school building law and other imperial examination reforms, making it more difficult for literati and children of aristocratic families to become officials, so there was the emergence of Buddhism
The civil unrest represented by believers is directly choking their lungs. How can there be no abnormality?
In this case, the local government must have a senior official sent by the central government to oversee the county affairs. Once an accident occurs, he can make a prompt decision to nip the rebellion in the bud and minimize the losses caused.
As a representative of the opposition, Fan Chunchun can certainly see this. However, as the leader of a moderate conservative, he still adheres to the ancestral method started by the late Emperor Zhenzong—stirring different opinions.
The previous conflicts of opinion were caused by ministers and scholars holding different political opinions in the court, thereby restricting each other and maintaining the majesty of the imperial power. However, the result was fierce party disputes in the court, and it was difficult for central government orders to be completely implemented - everyone
They are all busy trying to unite the party and fight against differences, so how can they care about governing the country and benefiting the people?
Since the officials came to the throne, they have basically abandoned "confusion with different opinions" and carried out major transformations of officials through various means to "unify their thoughts and unite as one". This made the government's execution efficiency during the Tianqi period far superior to that of previous emperors.
But the king's will and the emperor's heart have been the same since ancient times.
Through the reform of the official system, the government achieved the goal of killing two birds with one stone, that is, by specifying and clarifying the responsibilities of each agency and officials, and by supervising and restricting each other through each department, the goal of consolidating the monarchy was achieved.
It has evolved directly from the restriction of political opinions of "confusion of different opinions" to the check and balance of power and responsibilities of "everyone performs his own duties".
After nearly ten years of operation and improvement, the moderate conservatives led by Fan Chunchen have fully recognized this kind of progress. Now that it needs to be changed, they think it is unnecessary.
Conservatives are called conservatives because they strive for stability and are unwilling to make too many changes and improvements, which may lead to unknown risks.
Cai Bian saw that the pros and cons had expressed their attitudes. He glanced at the crowd and asked, "Do you have any other opinions? Feel free to speak up."
Everyone here spoke one by one. Basically, they were either on the positive side, supporting the establishment of a new member, Uncle Fang, or on the negative side, opposing the new establishment and maintaining the status quo. They just added a few more reasons to the arguments they supported.
.
Cao Duo stood on the positive side. He secretly calculated that the number of supporters of both sides was about the same, and they were evenly matched. As a result, this agenda was considered to be a stalemate.
But it is best not to have this kind of situation happen at the cabinet meeting - all the bachelors and bachelors have important positions and are busy with government affairs, so it is not easy to find time to attend the cabinet meeting. If the results can be discussed on the spot, it is best to be able to discuss them on the spot.
This situation reflects the ability of Dazai, the host of the cabinet meeting.
Generally, for controversial agendas, he would first discuss with Situ and Sikou to reach an agreement, and then talk to other cabinet elders respectively to listen to their opinions, adopt them or persuade them, and after several discussions, they could reach a basic agreement or win over them.
Most people agreed, and then it was discussed at a cabinet meeting.
It's just that this agenda was suddenly proposed by the officials, and Cai Bian was unable to communicate and negotiate with the cabinet elders in advance. However, he had already anticipated the current outcome. If he wanted to resolve the dispute, someone must speak out.
So Cai Bian turned somewhere and spoke. This chapter has been completed!