People in the Song Dynasty were lawless

Chapter 523: Laughing out loud, the Prime Minister's Courtyard is full of cattle and horses

At the beginning of the 14th year of the Qingli period, the Song army marched northward in a mighty force and destroyed the Jin Kingdom in a short while.

The country was destroyed, but it left behind a mess.

Just after the New Year, the Constitutional Yuan is faced with a host of problems.

In addition to looking at a large amount of last year's data every year and then using this data to adjust this year's plans.

There are also the plans and adjustment tables of various departments for this year, the focus of national development, and various other matters, big and small.

The most important and prominent issue is the issue of expanding territory.

Yes.

The Song Dynasty conquered the Liao Dynasty and gained control of the three northeastern provinces in later generations.

There is also the Changbai Mountain area in northern North Korea.

Vladivostok (Vladivostok) and part of Khabarovsk Krai in Russia.

As well as some areas in eastern Inner Mongolia in later generations.

Now that’s really the formula.

The soldiers on the front line just have to charge forward, but the prime ministers behind have a lot of things to consider.

The entire three northeastern provinces have an area of ​​about 78 square kilometers. Together with Vladivostok, the Khabarovsk frontier, and parts of northern Korea, the Song Dynasty suddenly had more than two million square kilometers of territory.

Although the Song army did not actually attack there, after the fall of the Jin Dynasty, almost all the tribes in those places turned to the Song Dynasty and surrendered to the Song army. The north changed hands overnight.

This was because the Mongols were too far away, but the Song army via the Yunshuo Road marched north to Linhuang Prefecture, which is the area of ​​Xilinguole League in later generations, and controlled the eastern part of Inner Mongolia.

If they had continued to advance deeper, I'm afraid that the entire Inner Mongolia and Outer Mongolia, covering an area of ​​three million square kilometers, would have become the territory of the Song Dynasty.

By then, various problems will follow one after another. Zhao Jun is only 41 years old, and he will probably be worried until his hair turns white.

But even so, there are a lot of troubles.

In late January, it is approaching February, when the weather is warm and flowers are blooming, and all things are reviving.

There was a heavy snowfall in Bianliang at the end of last year. Although the snow was thick, it could not cover up the various New Year celebrations held by the people of Bianliang, which were becoming increasingly prosperous and lively.

Moreover, during this period, factories were closed, schools were suspended, and government offices were on holiday. Except for a few officials who received high holiday subsidies to maintain the basic operation of the government, the scene was bustling everywhere.

Zhao Jun did not have a bad New Year. Unlike the New Year holidays of later generations which were only a few days, the New Year holidays for officials of the Song Dynasty were longer, lasting until the Lantern Festival on the 15th day of the first lunar month, and they did not go back to work until the 22nd day of the first lunar month.

In such a long day, we must always take a little time to relax.

But unfortunately, there are a lot of things to do after the New Year. On the morning of the 22nd, it was still raining outside and the weather was gloomy, just like the mood of the twelve prime ministers sitting in the Constitutional Court.

“Land fever.”

"Well, who isn't?"

"I remember that Hanlong was eager to recover this and that in the past. Why is he unhappy now that he has gained so much territory?"

"I was young and ignorant at that time. Besides, I was just talking about it. Theory and practice are two different things."

"It's only after you sit in this position that you realize how expensive it is to be the head of a household."

"Yes, although the saying that the butt determines the head is not pleasant to hear, it is very reasonable."

In the room, Zhao Jun looked at the mountains of official documents, as well as the documents that the clerks of the Imperial Decree Office were still sending to the Constitutional Council. He held his forehead and felt like dying.

Although he is a workaholic, he is not a masochist.

In fact, there are a lot of things to do in the country after the Chinese New Year every year. Everywhere is clamoring to build this and that, setting up factories, building railways, constructing dams, and digging rivers.

This is just a major national development issue.

Many other matters also need to be decided by the Constitutional Court.

For example, after the judicial reform, although the three powers are separated, there are too many false and wrongful cases in this era. Once the three courts encounter problems, they pass the buck and act like rogues in order to avoid responsibility.

The concealment below and the deception in the middle.

Sometimes, one even has to see the family of the person involved seeking justice in the newspaper before the Control Yuan discovers that there is a problem, and then reports it to the Constitutional Yuan, which then sends people to investigate.

You don't know until you check. Once you check, you'll be shocked to find that all kinds of problems emerge one after another, and there are all kinds of evil spirits everywhere.

Things like forced confessions, forced charges to solve cases, prosecutions without evidence, rapid imprisonment, and even "suicide" in prison are outrageous.

Moreover, this is not an isolated problem, but a widespread problem across the country. There are many unfair cases in the three-department system in various places, including the county lieutenant, the Supervisory Commission, and the Supreme Court. There are a lot of unjust, false and wrongful cases, which happen every year.

This is a question of system.

Although the system was worse before, the rate of false and wrongful convictions was more than ten times higher than it is now, so much so that as long as you paid money, the county or state magistrate would create a case for you even if there was no case.

For example, when Zhao Jun first toured the country, he encountered a case where someone spent a large sum of money to ask the state officials to fabricate false charges in order to seize the property of a competitor, kill the person, and then embezzle the other party's property.

But the problem is that these situations still exist. The upper level requires fairness and justice, and requires local governments to seek the welfare of the people. However, the lower level can persecute innocent people unscrupulously for the sake of government efficiency.

Such behavior is really infuriating.

The Constitutional Yuan has to take various measures every year to severely criticize the three-bureaucratic system below, which is becoming increasingly perfunctory.

For example, we should increase supervision, strengthen public opinion supervision through newspapers and magazines, report controversial cases to the Supreme Court for direct adjudication, emphasize the principle of presumption of innocence and procedural justice in local judicial institutions, and so on, in order to maintain judicial fairness.

And that’s not all.

After industrialization, all parts of the country have been engaged in construction, actively pursuing development and accelerating commercial circulation.

The Song Dynasty itself was an era of highly developed commodity economy. The success of the First Industrial Revolution naturally led to commercial development and prosperity that was more than ten times stronger than before.

If there is development, there must be relevant industry regulations. Otherwise, the industry will grow wildly and all kinds of illegal means that do not comply with the law will be born.

Therefore, no matter whether it is business, people's livelihood, or handicraft manufacturing, hotels, restaurants, brothels, etc., if it involves related industries, you must obtain relevant certificates to comply with relevant laws and regulations.

But the problem is that when people run to various departments to handle procedures and get certificates, the administrative efficiency in many places is low, there are frequent delays, and some officials are trying to take advantage of the situation and take advantage of it.

It's easier said than done if you give me money.

You don't even have to go there in person. As long as you have public verification, that is, household registration information, they can handle it for you remotely.

If you don't give money.

It is normal for something that only requires two or three trips to a department and can be completed in two or three days to take three to five months, or even a year or two.

So although this is a good era, it is much better than the previous feudal era.

However, there are still problems in various aspects that require the Constitutional Yuan to respond at all times and take various relevant measures to maintain national development, strict laws, and social order and moral stability.

In this situation, the Constitutional Yuan itself has to face and encounter endless problems every year in all aspects, which require a lot of time and energy to solve.

As a result, another big trouble arose.

"Why not just rule them under a tributary system? Even though it's a bit chaotic, at least we don't have to directly manage them. We can just ask them to pay a certain amount of taxes every year, and the business can still maintain its original form."

"What's the point of conquering it? In the past, there were import and export taxes on the business model, but now that it's our territory, there are no more import and export taxes."

"Isn't it better? Without taxes, it will promote business prosperity. If business is prosperous, won't our taxes be higher?"

"Under the tributary rule, we have no actual control. Who knows what they are doing over there? If a large number of merchants move their factories and manufacturing industries over there, they will not have to pay taxes at all."

Zhao Jun rolled his eyes at Fu Bi.

The young prime ministers in the Constitutional Court tend to think too simply.

In other words, when considering national affairs, especially those in which one is not proficient, it is easy to fail to think far enough.

The system of controlled rule is indeed a method, in which the leaders of each tribe maintain the grassroots order. The Song Dynasty court only needs to manage the leaders of each tribe to indirectly control the north.

But on the one hand, this method is unstable, and on the other hand, without actual rule, it is impossible to intervene in the local area.

Just like the southwestern border areas of the Ming and Qing dynasties were mostly governed by the system of controlled regions, which resulted in the local chieftains having too much power. Rebellion, non-payment of taxes and opposition to the imperial court were common occurrences.

In addition, since the north was nominally the territory of the Song Dynasty, there was less tax on trade and there was no way to intervene locally, so it became a natural tax haven.

This was naturally intolerable for Zhao Jun, who continued the Song Dynasty's armed tax collection system and transformed all the tax collectors from the former Commercial Tax Bureau into tax police from the local tax bureau to collect taxes.

So the rule of ties will definitely not work. "What should we do then?"

Han Qi spread his hands and said, "If we change the natives to Han people, there are too few Han people there. They are all ethnic minorities and will not obey the rules at all."

"This is the crux of the problem, and it's also the reason why I don't want the Liao Kingdom to perish."

Zhao Jun shook his head: "After all, if we don't conquer it, then the problem will only be left to the Liao Kingdom to deal with. It is better for us to govern our own country well, but now."

Fu Bi spread his hands and said, "What else can we do? We can't just watch the Jin Kingdom being reestablished."

"Yes, Han Long has said before that the Jin Kingdom has evil ambitions. At least the Liao Kingdom did not have the ability to destroy us, but the Jin Kingdom caused the Jingkang Shame."

"Alas, national hatred and family feuds. Although they are national hatred and family feuds that will only happen in the future, they are as if they are right in front of us. How can we not destroy the Jin Dynasty?"

"It was fun to destroy the gold, but now it's a big trouble."

Zhao Jun said: "During the Ming and Qing dynasties, it took hundreds of years to slowly rebuild the Liaoze in the Northeast and make it a fertile land. Therefore, after the founding of New China, we must immediately take over the Northeast. Not only is the Northeast fertile, but it is also the best breeding ground for building an industrial base. But now..."

He curled his lips, picked up the teacup beside him and took a sip, then shook his head and sighed, "You have all read the survey, maps and reports of the Imperial City Bureau. You know what the Northeast is like now. It is a world of mountains, forests, rivers, swamps and lakes. There are very few plains. The mountains and plains are either inhabited by ethnic minorities like primitive tribes or jackals, tigers and leopards. It is common to have no people for hundreds of miles. What a huge price it must have cost."

Many years ago, the Imperial City Bureau disguised itself as merchants engaged in trade and began to go deep into various countries to gain intelligence.

Some would understand local politics, some would understand local economy, and still others would search for various minerals, forests, and terrains, and then draw blueprints and write manuals, which would be submitted to the Constitutional Council.

The most typical example is Japan. The Song Dynasty was able to make the current domestic politics in Japan so chaotic, while remotely controlling Japan and continuously grabbing large amounts of gold, silver, sulfur and other mineral resources from Japan. This has a lot to do with the Japanese branch of the Imperial City Bureau headed by Song Cai.

Therefore, the Song Dynasty already had a lot of intelligence about the Liao and Jin kingdoms, and naturally knew the current terrain and appearance of the Northeast well.

Given the current situation of the Northeast region being a swamp, if the Liao Kingdom still exists, then this problem can be left to the Liao Kingdom. Anyway, the Song Dynasty has no subjects there, so there is no need to worry about it. All we need to do is let the Liao Kingdom continue to provide resources to the Song Dynasty.

But now that the Northeast has been taken back, it has become a burden.

Because even if they clamor to recover their homeland and unify China, they still have to wait for the right opportunity to act.

Having such a large territory but lacking the ability to govern and develop it, and having to deal with a large number of ethnic minorities who refuse to obey discipline and the king, will only seriously drain the country's strength.

It would be better to wait a few more years, just like when we conquered Western Xia and defeated the Liao Dynasty, to allow the industrialization process to become stronger, and to have industrial products such as excavators and bulldozers, before we can manage and develop such a large swamp.

This has nothing to do with whether Zhao Jun cares about the Northeast or not, but only to do with the fact that there are indeed no Han people or people of the native ethnic group in the Northeast at the moment. Sending people to manage a foreign ethnic group is difficult in itself, and it also has to be developed. For the Song Dynasty, it is really not worth the loss.

"never mind."

Zhao Jun could only smile bitterly in the end and said, "Reform the natives and return them to the officialdom, and actually rule."

"Then how to do it specifically?"

Fan Zhongyan asked hurriedly.

“Two answers!”

Zhao Jun raised two fingers.

"First, recruit people and have a large number of immigrants go to the Northeast to develop the country."

"Second, mobilize a large number of troops to be stationed in the Northeast, set up a construction corps, recruit young and strong local ethnic minorities to join, use work instead of relief, and quickly build up the Northeast."

After he finished speaking, he looked around at everyone and said, "These two answers will definitely cost a lot of money every year, but once they succeed, the fertile black soil plains of Northeast China will bring countless productivity improvements to the Song Dynasty, which can be considered a high investment with high returns. However, this is a long-term plan, perhaps even a century-long plan. It will take a very long time for the investment to be effective, so you must be mentally prepared. The Song Dynasty will have to spend a lot of money in the Northeast for a long time in the future."

Everyone looked at each other and could only nod to show that they understood. Next year, they would have to spend an unknown amount of money on the Northeast.

But there is really no other way.

The higher the level of industrialization, the greater the ability to govern and exploit nature.

For swamps and lakes, a large number of excavators and bulldozers can build dozens of small canals for you within a few months, transport all the water to nearby rivers, and finally discharge it into the Bohai Sea.

Electric saws and cars can cut down large amounts of forest in just a few months and create a fertile black soil plain.

Now that none of these are available, we can only resort to the most primitive means - artificially repairing the river and manually cutting down trees.

The Northeast is now a swamp, and this is the only way.

Although it is the dumbest method, it is also the only way out, just like the Northeast was later reclaimed step by step by the Han nationality for hundreds of years during the Ming and Qing dynasties.

It can only be said that it was slightly better than the Northeast during the Ming and Qing Dynasties.

The Ming and Qing dynasties were still feudal agricultural societies, but the Song Dynasty was already an industrial country and had a modern system that was slowly transitioning to a system of nominal monarchs.

With such a system and technology, as long as the government's operating efficiency is high enough and the speed of technological development is fast enough, in a dozen years, a large number of modern industrial equipment will appear, which will greatly reduce the process of governance and development in the Northeast.

This is probably their only hope.

"Okay, then it's decided. You guys will figure out how to immigrate and how much money to invest in Northeast China this year. I still have things to do, including today's government affairs. I'll come and see you later."

After saying this, Zhao Jun stood up and prepared to leave.

Everyone felt a little overwhelmed looking at the already piled up documents. Now that a main force was missing, what could they do?

Yan Shu immediately stopped Zhao Jun and said, "Hanlong, you can't be lazy at this time. I am an old man, over 60 years old. If I have to deal with so many official duties, I am afraid I will die."

"Yes, Dean Zhi, you can't just run away because you have too much official business these days. Although we have the right to review, the final decision is in your hands."

"Yes, yes, I can't let you be lazy."

When everyone saw Yan Shu taking the lead, they all stood up to stop him.

They are usually afraid of Zhao Jun, but they can't care about that at the moment. If Zhao Jun, the person who makes the final decision, leaves, their workload will be much greater.

"When I was touring the country before, you still had to work. When I was not around, you could vote. The reason why I appointed twelve chancellors was to make eleven chancellors when I was not around, so as to guarantee the right to vote."

Zhao Jun said speechlessly: "And I really have something important to do."

"what's up?"

Yan Shu asked.

"check it out."

Zhao Jun took out a few notes and said with a smile, "I have a little surprise for the emperor."

Yan Shu took it and glanced at it, and saw that the content of the note was very simple. The Beijing-North Railway, Beijing-Hangzhou Railway, and Beijing-Changsha Railway were all completed in the past six months.

"What kind of surprise is this?"

Yan Shu was puzzled and asked, "Hasn't the emperor known about these things a long time ago?"

"Yeah, so I saved it up and told him again."

Zhao Jun smiled mysteriously and was about to leave.

But Fan Zhongyan stopped at the door like a door god and shouted, "Don't leave! What are you doing? Tell me everything."

Outrageous.

Zhao Jun rolled his eyes and could only say: "These railways have been built, and palaces in Chang'an, Chengdu, Hangzhou, Luoyang, Jinling, Hangzhou, Guangzhou and many other places have also been built. This is what I promised the emperor, and now is the time to fulfill it."

At that time, Zhao Zhen felt sad and lonely because he couldn't even leave the palace. Zhao Jun saw it and felt sad for him for a moment.

Although he is the emperor of a country and has fine clothes and delicious food, he should not be pitied in the eyes of the common people.

But having fine clothes and delicious food, but losing freedom, he is no better than the people of Song Dynasty today, who can not only travel all over the country but even go abroad without any hindrance. In this way, he seems like a wealthy prisoner.

So in order to comfort Zhao Zhen, Zhao Jun promised Zhao Zhen that after the railways and palaces in various places were repaired, he would take Zhao Zhen to travel around the country for fun.

of course.

Comforting Zhao Zhen was secondary.

The main purpose was to provide relief through work, and it happened to be time to carry out large-scale infrastructure construction in major cities, repair some ancient palace buildings, and at the same time, carry out large-scale construction to allow a large number of people to move into the cities to work, thereby comprehensively improving economic development.

Now that all the construction has been completed in various places, it is naturally time to fulfill the promise.

Zhao Jun patted Fan Zhongyan on the shoulder and said with a smile: "I'll leave the affairs of state to you. I'll take the emperor around the country. Just treat it as my third tour of the country."

As he said this, he laughed and walked out with his hands behind his back, leaving the prime ministers in the room looking at each other in bewilderment.

The happy New Year has just passed, and all the accumulated government affairs in the country are thrown in their faces, and there is also a mess in the Northeast that needs to be dealt with immediately, but he is just taking it easy. It's really infuriating.

(End of this chapter)