Ming Dynasty: Ask Zhu Yuanzhang to abdicate at the beginning

Chapter 255 Land Reform Begins!
"The fields of this dynasty are divided into official fields and private fields."

"When the country was first settled, Your Majesty formulated the basic national policy of using government farmland as the primary and private farmland as the supplementary."

"There are five strategies. The first is to confiscate the official fields and fields of powerful landlords of the previous dynasty, and give them to meritorious officials or rent them out to the people according to the division between officials and civilians."

"The second is 'never be a slave', which prohibits landlords from forcing tenants to become domestic slaves through debt or other means."

“The third is ‘never increase taxes’, stipulating that each household only needs to pay a certain amount of money, grain and labor service each year, and no increase can be made at will.”

"The fourth is 'never migrate'. As long as the people have farmland, the government cannot force them to migrate unless they have committed a crime and are sentenced to exile or other punishments."

“The fifth is ‘never sell land’, which means prohibiting ordinary people from selling their land at will to prevent land annexation.”

……

East Palace.

After seeing Zhu Gang off, Zhu Yunhuan immediately summoned his trusted associates to discuss matters.

Let Xia Yuanji report to him on the land and taxation system of the Ming Dynasty.

"All official fields are divided into five categories: imperial fields, royal fields, marriage fields, meritorious fields, and salary fields."

"The imperial fields are also called inner fields, which are fields owned by the imperial family."

"Royal fields are also called fiefdoms, which are fields owned by vassal kings."

"Marriage fields are also called princess fields, which are used for the princess's dowry or retirement."

"Honour fields are also called meritorious fields, and are used to reward meritorious officials for their contributions."

"Lutian is the land awarded to ministers."

……

"All civilian fields are divided into three categories: self-cultivated fields, tenant fields, and military farms."

……

"In order to understand the land situation in the world, the imperial court has three systems: the 'land book' system, the 'land edict' system, and the 'land tax' system."

"The land register is to register the land situation of each household according to household registration, land, taxes and other items, determine the grade of the land, and regularly check and update it."

"The land decree is to make public the status of each acre of land according to the land's grade, yield, rent and other items. If there are omissions or wrong assessments, the people can also appeal."

"Land surveys are to conduct regular inspections based on population growth and decline, land abandonment, tax changes, etc., to adjust and balance the land situation of each household."

……

"The court has three more strategies to protect and improve the land."

"One is to develop water conservancy, dig rivers, build dams, dredge irrigation, and prevent floods."

"The second is to reward farming and weaving, requiring every household to grow crops such as grain or cotton specified by the court."

"The third is to prohibit land reclamation. To prevent ordinary people from destroying forests and reclaiming wasteland indiscriminately, no reclamation is allowed in any of the prohibited reclamation areas."

……

Zhu Yunhuan listened quietly, his brows slightly furrowed.

Before that, he had also consulted archival materials.

Because according to the plan in Zhu Yunhuan's mind, the land system reform in the Ming Dynasty would be carried out simultaneously with the princes' voyage.

When the princes left the Ming Dynasty, they would leave behind a large amount of farmland, which could be distributed to landless farmers, thus marking the beginning of the Ming Dynasty's land reform.

However, when I really got to know the land system of the Ming Dynasty in depth, I found that many things seemed to be more complicated than I had expected.

At least, on the surface, there was nothing wrong with the Ming Dynasty's land system.

It can even be said to be perfect.

Just a few rules such as never being a slave, never having additional taxes, and never selling land have almost plugged all the drawbacks and loopholes.

Water conservancy and land reclamation ban have taken into account not only the development and utilization of farmland, but also environmental protection has been estimated in advance.

What else can we say about a feudal dynasty that has such a perfect system?

But the question is, if this is the case, why was the actual development of the Ming Dynasty in history so unsatisfactory?
Many policies eventually became dead paper and were not implemented.

Zhu Yunhuan closed his eyes, lay on the chair with his head tilted back, his body swaying slightly, and tapping the armrest of the chair lightly with his hand.

In the room, Yang Shiqi, Yao Guangxiao, Xia Yuanji and others all looked a little strange.

Zhu Yunhuan would tell them everything that happened on weekdays and would not hide anything from them.

But when he called them here today to discuss matters, he didn't say anything, which naturally surprised several people.

After Xia Yuanji finished his introduction, the room fell into silence.

Silent for a long while.

"Your Highness the Crown Prince, do you want to discuss how to deal with the land of the vassal kings after the abolition of the feudal system?" Yang Shiqi had some vague guesses.

Although Zhu Yunhuan had not told them about the withdrawal of the feudal system, the Prince of Jin had already gone to sea, and they all knew that the withdrawal of the feudal system by the Ming Dynasty was imminent and could be launched at any time.

Zhu Yunhuan did not comment and asked, "Do you have any suggestions?"

"This is very easy to handle." Yang Shiqi said with a smile: "It turns out that the fields of the princes were originally rented out to tenants in the surrounding areas for cultivation. Generally, they would not change the tenants at will. They were all permanent leased fields."

"Now that the imperial court has abolished the feudal lords, the land of the former feudal lords has been taken back by the imperial court and can continue to be cultivated by the original tenants."

"It's nothing more than the king's land being changed to the emperor's land, and the rent paid to the vassal king being changed to the tax paid to the imperial court. There's not much difference."

"Your Highness need not worry about this."

He paused, then continued meaningfully: "If this is done, the tenants will not change, and it will be safer. There will be no turmoil or unrest caused by the court's withdrawal of the feudal system."

This sentence is very profound.

Yang Shiqi saw that Zhu Yunhuan wanted to take advantage of the opportunity of abolishing the fiefdoms to make major changes to the land that originally belonged to the princes.

But in his opinion, abolishing the feudal system was something that could easily cause unrest.

If we change our approach to the feudal domains, the risks will be even greater.

Some princes who were already dissatisfied with the abolition of the feudal system were worried that they could not find an excuse to provoke the people below.

The court cannot give him power at this time.

The best strategy is to keep everything unchanged if possible and to make a smooth transition if nothing needs to be changed.

It has to be said that what Yang Shiqi said was also a mature and wise view on state affairs.

But it was far from what Zhu Yunhuan had planned.

However, after listening to Yang Shiqi's words, he suddenly seemed to grasp something in his mind.

Permanent tenancy of land.

Correct.

It's permanent tenancy!
The so-called perpetual leased land means that the tenant farmers permanently rent the land from the landlord and the land remains unchanged for generations.

The landlord is not allowed to increase the rent or sublet the land to others, so it is called "permanent tenancy".

Permanent tenancy first appeared in the Song Dynasty, gradually took on a larger scale in the Yuan Dynasty, and further developed in the Ming Dynasty.

Especially in the Jiangnan region, especially in the southeast coast, permanent tenancy was very popular.

In the north, the land was mainly owned by the princes, and perpetual tenancy was practiced.

Permanent tenancy divided the ownership and use rights of land.

That is, the landlord owned the land, while the tenant had the right to use it.

Under this system, landlords could only collect fixed rent and had no right to increase the rent at will or interfere with the tenant farmers' farming.

Tenant farmers have the right to return, sublease or mortgage the tenancy rights in accordance with the contract, and the land and field surface can be transferred separately, provided that it does not affect the landlord's rent collection and the tenant farmers' farming.

The perpetual tenancy system had a profound impact on agricultural production and society.

First, it mobilized the enthusiasm of tenant farmers and promoted land reclamation and agricultural development.

Secondly, the perpetual tenancy system guaranteed the personal freedom and production and living security of the tenants. Compared with the original tenants, the status of the perpetual tenants was greatly improved because the landlords could not increase or change the rent.

Farmers in many places have fought for the right to perpetual tenancy.

In addition, the permanent tenancy system also promoted the transfer and large-scale operation of land, and improved agricultural production efficiency.

It is no exaggeration to say that the emergence of perpetual tenancy was definitely a great progress in feudal society.

However, everything has its opposite.

Feudal society always has a magical power that can turn good things into bad things step by step.

The emergence of perpetual tenancy actually greatly accelerated the process of land annexation, causing the land to quickly flow into the hands of a small number of large landlords.

why?

The reason is naturally the court's tax system.

Officials, people who have passed the imperial examinations, and other local gentry are entitled to tax exemptions and reductions.

As a result, many people simply transferred their land to local gentry free of charge in order to evade state taxes.

One of the key reasons why they dared to do this was the emergence and development of permanent tenancy.

That is, when transferring the land, a contract should be signed first.

The ownership of the land will only be transferred to the other party's name, but it will be leased to me and my descendants forever, from generation to generation, and will never change.

And the rent of the land was agreed upon and could never be increased.

In this way, the owner of the land will feel at ease to transfer the land to others.

By separating the right of use and giving away the ownership, the right to use the land is actually still in one's hands.

The gentry who received the land ownership as a gift got the title of owner for free and could collect extremely low rent, and they were happy to do so.

It's a free benefit anyway, so why not take it?

It can be said that the two sides hit it off immediately.

Therefore, similar transfers have become popular and become a trend.

Just imagine, if there was no perpetual tenancy system, the people would not have such "smart" operations.

Without this system, one's own interests will not be guaranteed and protected after the land is transferred.

Who dares to transfer it casually?
The perpetual tenancy system, which was designed to protect the interests of tenant farmers, has become a means for some people to exploit loopholes and evade taxes.

However, what these "smart" people did not expect was that after obtaining ownership of the land, how could the landlords and gentry be willing to collect only extremely low rent forever?

The protection provided by the perpetual tenancy system is ultimately limited.

Especially after decades, hundreds of years, and generations.

The other party will always try their best to make the descendants who handed over the land in the first place give up the perpetual tenancy, either passively or actively.

After all, the other party is the owner of the land and is naturally in a more advantageous position.

What's more, they were local gentry and their status was much higher than that of tenant farmers.

As the game progressed, everyone finally saw the truth and couldn't play anymore.

But that was many, many years later.

At least, in the eyes of today's "smart people", by transferring ownership, retaining the right of use, and agreeing to pay only extremely low rent, it is possible to perfectly evade court taxes and is well worth doing.

After Zhu Yuanzhang overthrew the Yuan Dynasty, he actually carried out "land reform" to a certain extent.

For example, it was stipulated that the land of all landlords who fled to other places would be nationalized and then distributed equally to the farmers who remained in the area.

Because of the frequent wars at the end of the Yuan Dynasty, many people fled, and this trick was very useful.

On the one hand, after people fled to other places, the fields were left uncultivated.

If the imperial court does not issue policies, no one would dare to plant it.

Because I don’t know when the other person will come back.

What if you have cultivated the land and the other party comes back? What should you do then?

Not only will you fail to make a profit, but you will also get yourself into trouble.

Lao Zhu’s policy is to take back the land as soon as the people leave.

Even if I return to my hometown, I will not recognize the original land deeds.

The fields were simply redistributed.

This method enabled many of the lower classes who originally had no land to obtain land.

Another method is to cleverly use several major cases in the early Ming Dynasty.

Such as the Hu Weiyong case, the Guo Huan case, the empty seal case, etc.

Especially in the Guo Huan case, many landlords were involved.

Zhu Yuanzhang took the opportunity to seize their land and transfer it to the court, and then distributed it to those who had no land.

In addition to land redistribution, another crucial measure is to vigorously promote the perpetual tenancy system.

Under the perpetual tenancy system, farmers who were originally tenants actually obtained land, which was of course welcomed by the poor people.

In order to set an example for the world, the imperial land of the imperial court and the royal land of the vassal kings were all implemented with perpetual tenancy.

In a sense, tenant farmers under the perpetual tenancy system are not much different from self-cultivating farmers.

Of course, it is hundreds or thousands of times better than ordinary tenant farmers.

But Zhu Yuanzhang never imagined that the perpetual tenancy system, which he had implemented with great difficulty and effort, would become a loophole for those people to exploit, and instead intensified the land annexation of the Ming Dynasty.

That's another matter.

At least, in the current Ming Dynasty, the perpetual tenancy system still has more advantages than disadvantages.

Moreover, Zhu Yunhuan thought of another thing. The perpetual tenancy system might be an excellent entry point for him to reform the land system.

Before this, he had privately sounded out some ministers several times and talked about the issue of allocating land tax to each household.

Unexpectedly, it was met with unanimous opposition from the ministers.

No one supported it, including Yang Shiqi.

The reason is very simple. Dingyin, Lijia, and equal labor service are the main sources of income for local governments.

It is also one of the most effective means for local governments to strengthen their rule at the grassroots level.

Once the land tax is implemented, not only will the burden on land increase greatly, but more importantly, local governments will lose the motivation to control and manage the population.

The country’s management of its population will get out of control, posing a huge threat.

Zhu Yunhuan knew very well that this matter involved too many people, so he didn't say anything more and just laughed it off.

At this moment, when I heard about the permanent tenancy of the land, I suddenly realized that it was a good opportunity.

The system of allocating land tax based on acreage cannot be implemented for the time being, and dividing all land equally is even more impossible, but what if we try another method?

Perhaps, that is the best entry point for land reform.

Zhu Yunhuan's mind was full of thoughts, and he smiled and said, "You are right, let's do it this way."

When Yang Shiqi heard this, he immediately breathed a sigh of relief.

He was afraid that His Royal Highness the Crown Prince would use this opportunity to carry out some reforms and cause trouble.

There have been enough changes in the court at the moment, so it is better to take things one step at a time.

"After the withdrawal of all the princes, the amount of royal land has increased dramatically, and management needs to be strengthened." Zhu Yunhuan changed the subject and said, "The royal family has no private affairs. From now on, the royal land will be managed by the Ministry of Revenue, and the palace will no longer interfere."

When these words were spoken, Yang Shiqi and Xia Yuanji were both slightly startled, and even the old monk Yao Guangxiao showed a look of surprise.

……

(End of this chapter)