eldest son of Ming dynasty

Chapter 184
Nature hates a vacuum.

In the Zhejiang case, although Qian, Xu, Song and other merchant families were forcefully arrested, after they left, it does not mean that no one will do these businesses.How many small and medium businessmen are waiting to nibble these gaps.

But in Zhejiang province, the governor Wang Hua has the heaviest burden to turn from chaos to governance. He can also listen to the opinions of Zhang Yong, Mei Kejia and others when handling the case.But the life of the common people does not depend on the imperial court handling cases. Fields must be planted, silk must be weaved, and all civil affairs must be returned to the right track, so he, the governor, can account to the imperial court.

Moreover, Wang Hua came from Zhan Shifu. As early as the 12th year of Hongzhi, he knew that the prince was the most important in practical affairs, so after batches of criminal officials left for the capital, he also began to clean up the mess.

As the old saying goes, without agriculture there is no stability, without business there is no wealth.

Although the status of merchants is not high, the circulation of goods still depends on them.And business is first in a stable social environment.

Therefore, Wang Hua did two things. One was to rectify the security situation in various prefectures and prefectures in Zhejiang, and to eliminate the impact of the major case as soon as possible. Anyway, the house ransack also confiscated money, so it is still possible for him to apply for some as salary.

The second is that the government strongly advocates the resumption of commercial activities in the past, and relaxes the business activities of the common people to a certain extent. Stores that used to belong to a certain industry will be reopened as soon as possible, and the ownership will be recorded under the governor's office first. How to deal with this can be discussed later. solve.

It is mainly some silk weaving workshops. Because of the large number of people involved, almost every family has dozens of large and small workshops. Now the total number of looms in existence has reached more than 1.

Silk is Meiji's main business, Mei Kejia doesn't really care about it, but just wants to unify the silk workshops.Unified production, unified management, and unified sales. Of course, sales are still smuggled.

However, according to Wang Hua's general style, he didn't dare to make his own opinion on such a major event involving millions of dollars. Whether Mei Kejia's suggestion was feasible, he still had to report to the prince before implementing it.

But in any case, people's survival is a natural motivation. Let alone a few businessmen, or the emperor is gone, what should be done or what should be done.

As long as there is an army to maintain order, Hangzhou, Jiaxing, Huzhou and other places are basically in order. The current economic model itself is also a small-scale peasant economy. Although daily life will be somewhat inconvenient, as long as the impact is controllable, it will not matter.

In addition, it is the end of the year, and next year's spring plowing must not be delayed.

With so many of the above affairs, it is okay to rely on the governor’s office to support them in a short period of time, but it will be bad if it takes a long time, so Wang Hua also made it clear in the memorial to the capital that after the Spring Festival at the latest, the vacant official vacancies have to make up.

The East Palace and the cabinet no longer care as much about who is arrested as before. The key now is that Zhejiang must be managed after the arrest.Therefore, there have been frequent exchanges of documents between Zhejiang and the capital recently, and most of them are to ask the prince for instructions.

Zhu Houzhao opened up a special office space for himself, and there are books and desks in the room, all of which are for his "secretaries", such as Fengxi and Jin Gui. Because of the shortage of manpower, Wang Jia recommended two more. People are all talents who pay more attention to the theory of manipulating the world and practicality. One is Wang Xian, who is the 15th Jinshi of the Yiwei Division, and Guo Shangli, the 75th Jinshi of the Renxu Division.

These people are pure secretaries, and what they do is to convert Zhu Houzhao's spoken language into written language.And all kinds of documents are classified according to the method mentioned by the prince for easy reference.

There are official positions and money in Zhejiang's affairs. If we don't set up a special class to supervise the handling, the efficiency is really unacceptable to modern people like Zhu Houzhao.

However, it was the ministers of the DPRK and China who really discussed countermeasures with the prince.

The most important thing is two things, one is that the list of officials in Zhejiang is to be published, and the other is that those merchants... have their homes stolen, their property is not all cash, and there are many shops. If there are many, there must be special management.

"There must be a great order after the chaos, and let the people and officials see that Zhejiang has a new look after the rectification, otherwise others will think that we are really tossing around." This is Zhu Houzhao's general request, so he This sentence has been emphasized all the time, "The measures that Zhejiang governor Wang Hua has carried out must be recognized. He has also worked hard recently. Mr. Wang, you can give certain rewards as appropriate."

"Yes. I understand." Wang Jiazhi replied.

"The selection of the chief envoy and the inspector..." Zhu Hou took care that everyone was his own. "Let me make it clear that it is not appropriate for Zhejiang to appoint officials who can only study and have no experience in government affairs at this time."

This was a clear request from the crown prince, and it was difficult for Mr. Liu Ge, as well as several ministers and ministers to say anything.

Zhu Houzhao was reviewing a paper a few days ago. He rubbed his forehead and recalled, "Henan Chief Envoy Wang Qiong, I remember that he was very effective in harnessing rivers in the past?"

This person was first mentioned by Wang Jia to Zhu Houzhao.

"Returning to Your Highness, there is indeed such a person, and he is a capable official."

Yes, it is capable.

"Transfer him to be the chief political envoy of Zhejiang."

"Yes."

Wang Qiong is quite capable, and he can be regarded as a generation of famous ministers.In fact, in Zhu Houzhao's mind, Wang Hua probably won't be governor for long after the Zhejiang case, so Wang Qiong will take over.

But the adjustment of personnel must pay attention to the rhythm. Wang Hua is still trying to sort out Zhejiang. If he changes people halfway, Wang Qiong will have to start from the beginning again. This is not worth it.

"According to the envoy?"

Min Gui suddenly said, "Your Highness, I would like to recommend Peng Ze, the head of the Ministry of Punishment."

Zhu Houzhao had never heard of this name, so he only asked, "Do you have experience in local government affairs?"

"Yes, Peng Ze was transferred from the prefect of Huizhou to the head of the Criminal Department."

"Okay, after going down, the Ministry of Officials will check the performance appraisal of the person. If he is first-class or second-class, he will be transferred to Zhejiang as an inspector."

Min Gui seldom recommended officials on his own initiative, and Zhu Houzhao would agree to it once in a while.Moreover, Min Shangshu also has a straight personality. If ordinary officials are not bold enough or hypocrite, they will not be able to catch his eyes.

However, His Royal Highness asked a question of 'experience in local government affairs', which is quite particular.Speaking of it, it is a long-term process to change the atmosphere of the officialdom and make it more pragmatic, and it cannot be achieved by an imperial decree.

It is to emphasize the importance of practical work experience again and again in the process of promoting officials, so that civil servants will put their minds on the place.It is Zhu Houzhao's goal to make those officials who only know the difference between a gentleman and a villain every day unpopular.

After the provincial officials are appointed, the prefects must also be carefully selected.In fact, to a certain extent, the prefects at the grassroots level are more important than the provincial officials, and the chief ministers and inspectors cannot get in touch with very detailed things, so the prefects should not be exaggerated.

In a tax-heavy province like Zhejiang, Zhu Houzhao didn't want to adopt the method of "retreat after winning the battle", so he called Wang Jia and said, "Let the Ministry of Officials draw up these few people first."

Generally, when the crown prince said this, Wang Jia, the Minister of the Ministry of Officials, would understand.

But Min Gui, who had just retreated, thought about it for a while, and then came out and said, "Your Highness, do you think that I should also appoint some officials who are not from the academy to train them?"

Exercise is an excuse, a nice way of saying it.

Min Gui was not one of those people. Zhu Houzhao knew that a few days ago, Min Shangshu went up to defend the crown prince and pointed out that some officials in the court were discussing the court's state policy in private.Although this memorandum did not succeed in getting the prince to take any measures, it was because Zhu Houzhao was intentionally brewing this situation, not because Min Gui's suggestion was wrong.

At this time, when a minister with such an attitude makes such a suggestion, Zhu Houzhao might as well listen to it, "Why?"

Min Gui said with some concern: "This time, the handling of the Zhejiang case, there were censors and various departments in the imperial court who raised objections to the matter, and some of them became bolder after they became white... and the so-called governance is about balance. Youdao, if everything comes from the academy, I'm afraid the criticism will be even worse."

More criticism?

Zhu Houzhao thought to himself, in this way, dispatching officials to Zhejiang can kill two birds with one stone...

"Old Liu Ge, do you think what Da Si Kou said is reasonable?"

Liu Jian observed the expression of the prince just now, he was suspicious and did not dare to say more, so he said: "The appointment of officials by the imperial court is based on whether it is based on the situation in Zhejiang. He is an official of His Highness, how can we tell the difference?"

Zhu Houzhao couldn't help chuckling, this old fox.

"Big Sikou, you heard that. Let's listen to Mr. Ge and give priority to what is beneficial to the situation in Zhejiang."

That's how Min Gui mentioned it, it's up to His Highness if you can do it.These issues are not big and key issues, and if he disagrees, he will stop pursuing them.

"Follow the prince's orders."

Zhu Houzhao rubbed his chin, "Since it's decided, then proceed accordingly. Next year, the cabinet will choose an opportunity to send officials to Zhejiang for inspection to see how the local social environment is recovering and whether the lives of the people and businessmen are in order. If there is any The problem can be solved after reporting it. The official sent at that time, if you let him enter the palace, the palace still has an explanation."

When the cabinet officials and ministers heard what the prince said, they all had the idea of ​​agreeing.

Although the prince's rule of the country is somewhat different from those of them, he does things from beginning to end, and tries to be as thoughtful as possible.No matter what it is, as long as it passes through his hands, it will never be thrown away.For example, some of them did not consider the situation after going to Zhejiang to inspect the major case.

"Yes." Liu, Li, and Xie had no objection to this arrangement.

"In addition..." After the arrangement, it was the turn of 'wealth'. Zhu Houzhao picked up another memorial, "This time, many merchants' homes in Zhejiang were confiscated, so in addition to silver, there are many shops, houses, workshops... ...Because of the large number, Zhejiang is also asking the court to come up with a solution. So let’s discuss it too.”

Normally, all the property of the prisoner was confiscated and returned to the state treasury.However, it is not necessary to sell all these things. A fire sale will not only sell assets cheaply, but also breed secondary corruption.

More importantly, Zhu Houzhao also has other ideas, for example, nationalization, but this requires a special management department similar to the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission.Mei Kejia's idea of ​​building a large ship probably came from this, so Zhu Houzhao was not willing to let go of this opportunity.

It's just that he didn't dare to mention the imperial court's business in Hongzhi for ten years. Even if he has grown wings at this time, it is not so easy to implement it. It may be another bloodbath.

(End of this chapter)