History of the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms

Chapter 24

【Research guarantee party】

Wei Baoheng passed the imperial examination in 864 and started his official career. But his real political career should be counted from his marriage to Princess Tongchang in .

His time has come.

Wei Baoheng was a political upstart. Although his father and grandfather had been officials for two generations, they had no foundation in the court. He had been an official for a short time and had basically no connections. He just had a good romance and became a royal consort. In fact, the political resources he currently controlled were still quite limited. Wei Baoheng had a clear understanding of this.

This was no problem for Wei Baoheng, who was good at scheming and taking advantage of others. He knew how to quickly gain political benefits: clinging to someone powerful.

The one who caught Wei Baoheng's eye was another young hunk in the court - Prime Minister Lu Yan.

Lu Yan was equally handsome, suave, and shameless. The two of them were like-minded and hit it off immediately, forming the "Guarantee of Graduate School Party" and have been in cahoots ever since.

The Baoyan Party inherited and carried forward the glorious tradition of factional struggles in the middle and late Tang Dynasty. Unlike the previous "Niu-Li Party Struggle", the Baoyan Party did not encounter strong opponents, and the political struggle showed a "one-sided" crushing advantage.

In the eleventh year of Xiantong (870), at the beginning of the new year and before the Spring Festival was over, Wei Baoheng, then the Left Counselor, and Lu Yan, then the Prime Minister, jointly submitted a memorial to impeach Kang Chengxun, the commander-in-chief of the Xuzhou bandit suppression, accusing him of poor performance in combat.

Kang Chengxun was demoted again and again and became Sima of Enzhou (Enping City, Guangdong Province).

At this time, just two months had passed since the "Pang Xun Rebellion" was put down.

It was too embarrassing to be dismissed after only two months. Kang Chengxun's demotion became a pain in the hearts of everyone at that time and also became an important reason for the demise of the Tang Dynasty.

The derogatory document about Kang Chengxun is even more unbearable to read:

"I am a humble general, a lowly soldier, and I have never known a single soldier, yet I have been defrauded of such a high salary..." First, a personal attack, accusing him of being a mere slacker;
"Playing with the enemy without fighting, sitting still without moving forward..." He continued to accuse people of being passive and lazy;

"The ringleader collapsed on his own, Xuanren pledged loyalty...what contribution have you made?" Pang Xun's bandit gang "collapsed on their own", and the one who made the contribution was Zhang Xuanren who surrendered and revolted. What contribution have you made?

We don’t need to verify Kang Chengxun’s role in the war to quell the rebellion. Just looking at the wording of this imperial decree is chilling. Looking at the opinions on how to deal with Kang Chengxun, it is even more sad: first demoted to the position of tutor of the King of Shu, and sent to the Eastern Capital (deprived of all real power), then demoted to the position of Sima of Enzhou (traveling in Guangdong and Guangxi at public expense), and asked to “send him away at a high post”, and get out!
Even if there is no merit, there must be hard work. It is too ugly to kill the donkey after it has done its job.
The Baoyan Party won the first battle and got rid of Kang Chengxun, the hero of suppressing the rebellion. After all, Kang Chengxun was still an "external official" and not an "internal official". If they wanted to dominate the government and the country, they had to extend their claws into the court.

However, the court was a deep-rooted place with a complex network of forces. Wei Baoheng was also a nouveau riche in the core political circle. He had a shallow foundation and it was difficult for him to shake the bigwigs in front of him. If he was not careful, he would end up losing more than he gained.

How can one effectively strike down political enemies and at the same time escape unscathed? Wei Baoheng pondered over this question and finally moved God.

God gave him a golden opportunity—his wife died!

On the Mid-Autumn Festival of the same year that Wei Baoheng impeached Kang Chengxun, on August 21th, Princess Tongchang died of illness in the capital Chang'an at the age of , leaving us prematurely.

Princess Tongchang's life was one of extravagance, dissipation and decadence, and a short life. Her dowry when she got married was the most luxurious in history; her daily life and diet were no less luxurious than any other princess in history; her funeral was also on the historical list.

The reason why she was recorded in history was not because of her outrageous and high-profile display of wealth.

She was so good at dying. With her death, she completed a beautiful divine assist, allowing Wei Baoheng to thrive in the political struggle. Her death also created the bloodiest and most horrifying medical dispute in history.

[The bloodiest medical dispute in history]

When the news of Princess Tongchang's death reached the palace, Emperor Yizong of Tang was in deep grief, seeing her die at the tender age of 37 (Emperor Yizong was years old at the time).

Emperor Yizong of Tang turned his grief into a butcher's knife and ordered the execution of more than 20 people including the attending physicians Han Zongshao and Kang Zhongyin, and arrested more than 300 of their relatives and put them in prison, awaiting their next move.

The Supreme Prime Minister at that time (Zhongshu Shilang Tongpingzhangshi) Liu Zhan summoned the censors and ordered them to persuade the emperor not to vent his anger on the innocent imperial doctors.

The emperor was furious. All the censors remained silent and acted like turtles.

Liu Zhan had no choice but to personally submit a memorial to advise.

After reading the memorial, Emperor Yizong of Tang threw it aside, very unhappy.

Seeing that the emperor was unwilling to revoke his order, the upright Liu Zhan dragged the mayor of Chang'an (Jingzhao Yin) Wen Zhang and went before the emperor in person to present facts and reason with him face to face.

Wen Zhang, the one who was expelled from Xuzhou by the Silver Knife Army, has always been known for his impartiality and impartiality in enforcing the law.

Emperor Yizong of Tang was furious. He ignored the etiquette between the monarch and his subjects and shouted, "I gave you face, right? You idiot..." He cursed and drove the two men out.

Then, Liu Zhan was demoted to the governor of Jingnan, and Wen Zhang was demoted to the Sima of Zhenzhou. Zhenzhou is the area of ​​Sanya City in Hainan Province today. Today's Sanya is very different from the past. It gives us the impression of a feast of lights and wine, but in those days, it was a barren land of wildness and miasma.

At that time, the farthest you could be demoted or exiled was today's Guangdong, Guangxi, Jiangxi, and Fujian. If you were demoted to Hainan Island or had to cross the Qiongzhou Strait, it only meant that the emperor really hated you.

When Wen Zhang received the transfer order, he looked up to the sky and sighed: "Alas! I was born at the wrong time, so why should I regret dying?" That night, he committed suicide by taking poison.

When Emperor Yizong of Tang heard that Wen Zhang had committed suicide by taking poison, he was furious and issued an edict, which said: Wen Zhang must have done something wrong, so he committed suicide out of fear of punishment. This guy has committed so many evil things that he deserves to die! Pull his body outside the city and display it to the public until I am happy one day, and then I will allow him to be buried. This will please the people and make the evil villains afraid!
The victim of the family, the son-in-law Wei Baoheng, took advantage of Emperor Yizong's grief to kill with a borrowed knife and eliminate dissidents. He deliberately expanded the scale of this medical dispute, which eventually evolved into a horrific political persecution.

The death of Princess Tongchang was an important turning point in Wei Baoheng's political career. If he won, he would have great power; if he lost, he would be doomed. Most importantly, this was a battle that fate had arranged for him, and he had to fight whether he wanted to or not.

His only political capital was his status as a consort to the emperor, which was also the basis of his alliance with Lu Yan. With his wife dead, his favor from the emperor would plummet, and he would become a lamb to be slaughtered (after winning this battle, he slaughtered a consort to the emperor who had lost his power, as mentioned later).

Either explode in silence or perish in silence! Wei Baoheng cannot remain indifferent or sit there and wait for death. He must fight a desperate battle before his father-in-law gets over the loss of his daughter!
The whole family of the Prince Consort's mansion was immersed in grief. Last Spring Festival, the place was still decorated with lights and red curtains and red lanterns hung everywhere to welcome the bride, Princess Tongchang. Who would have thought that only one year and eight months later, the red theme was changed to black and white, and the red event was changed to a white event, and Princess Tongchang was buried.

There was only one person in the whole mansion who did not shed tears. He was hiding in the inner room of the mourning hall, where no one disturbed him and it was very quiet. At this moment, he was holding a small book, frowning and reading it carefully.

He was Wei Baoheng. What he was looking through was not the funeral account book, but the roster that he had carefully recorded, which contained all his political enemies and stumbling blocks.

"Who should be killed first?"

Political struggle, like military struggle, requires methods and strategies. When attacking, you must choose the right time and breakthrough point. You must have the main attack force, the assisting force, the feint attack force, the second and third echelons, and the strategic reserve force...

In the end, Wei Baoheng decided to use Liu Zhan, who had taken the initiative to run into the gun, as a breakthrough point and launch the first wave of attacks:
On September 9, Gao Xiang, Yang Zhizhi, Wei Shen and others were demoted to Lingnan on the charge of "being friendly with Liu Zhan."

These are all officials of the fifth rank or above, and they are not officials of powerful departments with real power. To put it bluntly, they are all small fry.

Wei Baoheng initiated a political struggle for his "deceased wife", and sacrificed them in the first battle, successfully taking the first blood.

Immediately afterwards, Wei Baoheng took advantage of the victory and joined forces with Lu Yan to frame the already low-health Liu Zhan, accusing Liu Zhan of secretly colluding with the imperial physician to deliberately poison Princess Tongchang.

Anyone with a brain can see that this is sheer nonsense! How could a prime minister, a royal doctor, poison the princess to death out of boredom? What was his motive?
Brain is a good thing, but unfortunately Emperor Yizong of Tang didn't have it.

On September 9, Liu Zhan was demoted to the post of governor of Kangzhou (Deqing County, Guangdong Province). Look, it's the Guangdong and Guangxi region.

The person responsible for drafting the imperial edict to dismiss Prime Minister Liu Zhan was Hanlin Academician Zheng Ting.

Zheng Ting was brought up by Liu Zhan, so in the draft, Zheng Ting spoke up for Liu Zhan. There is a sentence in the draft: "A house of several acres is still not his; he refuses bribes from all sides, only afraid that people will know", which means that Liu Zhan is honest and incorruptible.

Lu Yan shook the draft and sneered, "You are not deposing him as prime minister, you are clearly recommending him to be prime minister."

Afterwards, Zheng Ting was demoted to the post of governor of Wuzhou. Wuzhou is now Wuzhou City in Guangxi, and another governor of Guangdong and Guangxi was removed.

Zheng Ting had a very solid academic record and passed the imperial examination during the reign of Emperor Wuzong. Because he was very young when he passed the examination, when Emperor Wuzong first looked at the list, he actually thought he was a "relative" and wanted to personally re-examine him. Zheng Ting passed this test successfully.

Zheng Ting's father, Zheng Ya, was highly appreciated by Li Deyu and was promoted to Hanlin scholar. Zheng Ya then became a member of the "Li Party", and Zheng Ting was naturally classified into the "Li Party" group.

During the reign of Emperor Xuanzong, Bai Minzhong (Bai Juyi's younger brother) and Linghu Tao served as prime ministers. Both of them were from the "Niu Party", so Zheng Ting, a "remnant of the Li Party", was always marginalized and suppressed, and his official career was bumpy (so Ting was not promoted for decades).

Until Emperor Xuanzong passed away and Emperor Yizong ascended the throne, Bai Minzhong retired and died due to health reasons, and Linghu Tao was also excluded from the court. Liu Zhan admired Zheng Ting's talent, so he appointed him as an official. However, Zheng Xun, the right chancellor, was a member of Linghu Tao's party, so he sent Zheng Ting away again.

After Liu Zhan became prime minister, he promoted Zheng Ting for the second time and recommended him as a Hanlin scholar.

Therefore, Liu Zhan was grateful to Zheng Ting for his recognition and support twice. It was natural for Zheng Ting to speak up for Liu Zhan when he was unjustly demoted.

Please remember Zheng Ting, who was grateful for the kindness he received. He will make great contributions to the Tang Empire later on.

The "Research Protection Party" demoted Liu Zhan to Guangdong, but still felt unsatisfied, so they took out the "Ten Roads Map" which recorded the geography of the whole country, carefully studied geographical knowledge, and finally found a place even more remote than Guangdong - Huanzhou (now in Vietnam).

Therefore, Liu Zhan was demoted again to be the Sihu of Huanzhou.

Wei Baoheng's first wave of attacks was a complete victory. In the final stage, the "Baoyan Party" discovered a fish that had slipped through the net and quickly dealt with it: they demoted the Chief Censor Sun Yan to the position of governor of Tingzhou (now Ting County, a high-ranking county in Fujian), because he was also promoted by Liu Zhan and was a "follower of Liu Zhan."

Thanks to the book friend “150609180340598” for the recommendation!
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(End of this chapter)