Ming Dynasty man

Chapter 266 Economic Conquest
From a certain point of view, Li Jing's grasp of power and territory is very cruel, but when it is time to delegate power, he will definitely delegate power.

Li Jing is very clear about what to grasp and what to let go. Li Jing knows that if his subordinates do not have the power to make decisions and have to ask for instructions on everything, Li Jing will not be able to do so much work even if he is exhausted.

But delegating power does not mean letting go. In order to supervise officials not to abuse their power, Li Jing established the Metropolitan Procuratorate, which is exclusively in charge of officials.

However, the Metropolitan Procuratorate supervises officials above the county level, and officials below can only be governed by the county magistrate, which will inevitably lead to some problems, so Li Jingcai decided to set up the Civil Information Administration.

In the final analysis, the establishment of these departments is to maintain the system that Li Jing gradually established.

The system, what Li Jing ultimately needs to do is to use the system to manage officials, rather than relying on people to manage officials.

In fact, the system is the law, and violating the system is violating the law, and violating the law must be punished.

But Li Jing also knows that establishing a perfect system is definitely a huge project, and it cannot be established overnight.Haste makes waste, and doing too much will only backfire. We must give officials a period of adaptation, and gradually improve the system in the process of officials gradually adapting.

In addition, no matter how strict the system is, there will inevitably be loopholes, and people will take advantage of the loopholes, so someone must maintain the system.

However, if we want to maintain the system, we cannot rely on officials, we must rely on the common people. The Civil Affairs Bureau is the department for the common people to protect their own interests, and it is also the basic department for maintaining the system.

When the villagers took out what they thought were good things from their homes to entertain Li Jing, Li Jing told these people what he thought in the most straightforward words.

It's a pity that no matter how straightforward Li Jing's words are, most ordinary people still don't understand them.

Because since ancient times, officials have been in charge of ordinary people, and there have never been ordinary people in charge of officials.

The Civil Affairs Bureau set up by Li Jing asked the common people to supervise the officials, and the common people naturally couldn't believe it.

Seeing the ignorant looks of the villagers, Li Jing sighed lightly, knowing that it would also take a long time for the common people to accept his own ideas.

After chatting with the villagers for a while and eating something brought by the villagers, Li Jing took all the officials to visit several households before coming to the saltworks.

After inspecting the salt field for two days, Wang Chengen finally figured out how Li Jing handled the salt administration, and then bid farewell to Li Jing.

However, Li Jing did not break his promise, and when Wang Chengen was about to leave, he issued an exchange ticket for 20 taels of silver, and at the same time raised [-] shi of grain to give to Wang Chengen.

Seeing that almost all of the grains that Li Jing gave him were sweet potatoes, potatoes, and corn, Wang Chengen knew that these grains were actually seeds, and Li Jing was asking himself to promote these crops.

It should be said that Zhu Youjian was quite convinced by Wang Chengen's words. Soon after Wang Chengen returned to Beijing, Zhu Youjian issued an edict to promote these high-yielding crops in the northern provinces.

It's a pity that Zhu Youjian only did this one thing when Wang Chengen brought so much information back to Beijing. Zhu Youjian didn't pay attention to Li Jingbie's suggestion at all.

And it seemed that he wanted to prove something to Li Jing, and then Zhu Youjian appointed Chen Qiyu as governor of military affairs in Shaanxi, Shanxi, North Zhili (Hebei) and Henan provinces.

Hearing this appointment, Li Jing sighed. Both Hong Chengchou and Cao Wenzhao are obviously more suitable for this position than Chen Qiyu, but Zhu Youjian chose to appoint this person. I don’t know if Zhu Youjian deliberately challenged him or did not trust Hong Chengchou. and Cao Wenzhao.

But at this time, Li Jing no longer had the energy to pay attention to this issue, because at this time there was a news from Hongdong County that Li Jing didn't want to hear: a plague appeared in Hongdong County!
Upon receiving the news of the outbreak of the plague, Li Jing immediately summoned all the officials of Pingyang Mansion and ordered them to pay close attention to the direction of the spread of the plague. At the same time, he issued an order that anyone infected with the plague must go to the designated place for treatment.

In addition, Li Jing also ordered people to post notices, telling the people not to drink raw water, and to sprinkle slaked lime wherever there are mice infested. No matter what kind of animal carcasses they are, they must be burned with fire and not buried at will...

Following Li Jing's order after order, the entire Pingyang Mansion moved quickly.

Due to Li Jing's timely response and proper measures, the plague did not spread in Pingyang Mansion.

But Li Jing immediately received news that there was a problem in Zezhou, and the plague had spread to Zezhou.

Li Jing was also very helpless about this, because except for Lingchuan which belonged to Li Jing's sphere of influence in Zezhou, the rest of the region ignored Li Jing at all, and turned a deaf ear to Li Jing's reminders.

In addition, most of Zezhou was under the control of bandits. Bandits had always been unorganized and undisciplined. Even with Li Jing's reminder, they could not stop the spread of the plague.

The rogues couldn't stop the spread of the plague, that's all. What Li Jing couldn't tolerate the most was that the rogues themselves became the spreaders of the plague.

The rogues who were panicked by the plague did not dare to stay in Zezhou, and fled to the surrounding areas in several ways.

Wang Ziyong led his troops over the Taihang Mountains and fled into Jiyuan, while Gao Yingxiang led his troops northward into Lu'an Mansion.

Along the road, bandits infected with the plague continued to die, and at the same time spread the plague to the places they passed.

Let alone Li Jing, it doesn't matter who comes. The plague is actually the plague. It doesn't mean that killing the sick person is enough, and the corpse needs to be disposed of.Otherwise, the epidemic will only get worse.

But Li Jing's soldiers didn't have any gas masks. Once they came into contact with sick people, they would inevitably be infected. Once they were infected and brought back to the city, it would be a bigger disaster.

The population of Pingyang Mansion is about 200 million to 300 million. It is impossible for Li Jing to ignore the safety of these people. Once the plague is brought to Pingyang Mansion, Li Jing's hard work for many years may be ruined.

However, wherever the rogues passed by, the plague spread. According to Li Jing's estimation, at least 10 people would die as a result.

Seeing tens of thousands of people die, Li Jing is helpless, the feeling in his heart is hard to express.

Li Jing knew that in this situation, he could only wait and wait for the arrival of winter.

In winter, rats will burrow into the hole, and the greatest source of transmission of the plague will disappear, and then the plague will slowly disappear.

But now that summer has just entered, winter will be at least five or six months away, which means that the plague will continue to rage for at least half a year, and it is hard for Li Jing to imagine what will happen after half a year.

In the past, Li Jing was always afraid that winter would come too soon, but now he was looking forward to the arrival of winter soon.

In addition, when the plague broke out, Li Jing's business was greatly affected. Due to the raging plague outside, the merchants in Pingyang Prefecture did not dare to go out at all. All the materials produced by the factories were squeezed out. The source of income, Li Jing's financial pressure suddenly increased.

On this day, Li Jing sat in his study and was thinking hard about countermeasures, when his personal soldiers reported to Yu Leting for a visit.

Hearing that Yu Leting asked for an interview, Li Jing sighed, knowing that the investigation of the corruption case in the salt factory was almost done.

When Yu Leting entered the study, Li Jing saw his tired expression, stopped Yu Leting and saluted himself, poured a cup of tea and handed it to Yu Leting, "Junyang, you have worked hard during this time."

Yu Leting took the teacup and put it on the table, cupped his fists and said, "It's nothing to work hard, the key is to be able to do the things that the commander told you well."

Speaking of which, Yu Leting took out an account book from his sleeve and handed it to Li Jingdao: "Marshal, everyone is here, please have a look."

Li Jing took the account book and opened it to read it carefully. He frowned and thought for a while, then turned his head and said to the soldiers: "You go and invite the master over."

The soldier took the order and hurried out of the room.

Gently tapping on the cases, Li Jing pondered for a while and said, "Junyang, how do you plan to handle this case according to your opinion?"

Yu Leting said without hesitation: "The crimes committed by these people deserve more than death. In my opinion, they should all be killed."

Li Jing nodded slightly, noncommittal.

Seeing that Li Jing was silent, Yu Leting knew that his answer might not suit Li Jing's liking, so he didn't dare to say any more, but just drank tea silently.

After a while, the soldiers helped Yuan Keli over, and Li Jing hurriedly stood up to give up his seat to Yuan Keli.

After Yuan Keli sat down, Li Jing poured a cup of tea for Yuan Keli, and then gently placed the account book in front of Yuan Keli: "Sir, you always look at it."

Yuan Keli nodded, took the account book and read it carefully.

After a long time, Yuan Keli raised his head to look at Li Jing and said, "Jimin, but I'm a little hesitant whether these people should be killed or not?"

Li Jing nodded lightly and said: "Yes! Many of them are salt merchants. If these salt merchants are killed, the trade routes they laid before will be cut off, especially with the Mongolian side. What a pity."

Yuan Keli nodded slightly, pondered for a while and said: "It is not an exaggeration to kill these people for the crimes they committed, but you are very worried. If you change the salt merchants, it will indeed cost a lot to open up the Mongolian trade route again. If these salt merchants are not killed, then other salt merchants cannot be killed, and if the salt merchants are not killed, those officials cannot be killed. This is indeed a bit embarrassing."

Li Jing nodded lightly. The new law formulated by Li Jing stipulates that the crimes of accepting bribes and offering bribes are the same, that is to say, the charges of these people in the account book are the same. Can not kill.

Naturally, he will not be soft on killing the corrupt official Li Jing, but Li Jing has to be more cautious when it comes to the transaction with Mongolia.

You must know that it is not easy to open up trade routes in Mongolia. It is not just as simple as selling some salt. Salt, tea, cotton, ironware, etc. are all businesses that come with money. It is impossible to build such a trade route in a few years.

Li Jing will definitely wage war with Mongolia in the future, but to conquer Mongolia cannot rely entirely on force, sometimes economic conquest is better than force.

And if there is an economic opening before the use of force, then the use of force will get twice the result with half the effort.

Killing a few people is a trivial matter, but Li Jing must not affect his future plans just because of killing a few people.

If there is anyone who understands Li Jing's thoughts best, it is naturally Yuan Keli. It can be said that Yuan Keli knew that Li Jing did not want to kill these people after reading the account books.

As a politician, sometimes he has to consider the overall situation. Li Jing can think so far-reaching, and Yuan Keli is naturally very pleased.

But the crimes of these people are placed there. If they are not killed, there must be a reason.

Of course, Li Jing would never excuse these people himself. It is also a sign of political maturity to have others say this for Li Jing.

But the person who said this for Li Jing must be strong, and must have the right to manage this matter, that is to say, he must have a legitimate identity.Obviously, the one who can satisfy these two conditions is Yuan Keli.

Although Gao Qi and Shen Zheng also have this strength, but one of them doesn't care about civil affairs, and the other is Li Jing's father-in-law. If they intercede for the prisoner, they are not suitable for their status.

　Ask for support~
　　
　
(End of this chapter)