Chapter 1179 1270 Arrangement

"It's just a few cents of silver per mu, and a million acres is only a few tens of thousands of taels of silver."

Wei Guangde said leisurely, "To be honest, the taxes collected by the imperial court are really small."

Don't look at the history books that often state that the vassal palaces in the dynasty had tens of thousands of hectares of fields and millions of acres of land. If you really count them, the taxes you have to pay are actually only tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of taels of silver.

"Shan Loan, that's what I say, but in name, your Majesty no longer has an imperial village."

Zhang Juzheng also knew that the tax system should indeed collect taxes on the land of the nobles of the clan, but whether to collect it or not is not yet discussed, and there will be a lot of trouble involved later.

If taxes were levied on the clan's land, the privileges and exemptions given to scholars might be exposed by the clan.

Don't think this is a trivial matter. If it doesn't go well, it will cause turmoil in the world.

The idea that scholars are exempt from taxation has become deeply ingrained in the minds of ordinary people after years of continuous operation.

"Furthermore, if the clan sees that the royal family pays taxes, they will also pay, but they will definitely ask the court to tax the scholars according to the system.

In this way, I don't know how big of a disturbance it will cause. "

Zhang Juzheng continued.

The people knew that they had been deceived for so many years and that they had paid taxes for the gentry for so many years. They must have resentment in their hearts, and the consequences were unpredictable.

"I didn't say it before, just re-rate the tax exemption rules for the gentry. The same is true for the clan. Let's forget about the past and only trace back the taxes from the first year of Wanli."

Wei Guangde said, "As for the imperial village that my uncle said is no longer there, in fact you and I know it very well, and the ministers in the court also know it very well.

I have estimated that the so-called "official land" currently controlled by the imperial court is at least 47,000 hectares, and the nominal tax per year is only more than 200,000 taels of silver.

He Shuanglin said that the money must be actually paid into the treasury."

As soon as Wei Guangde said this, he saw Zhang Juzheng's lips moving slightly, as if he was about to interrupt. He hurriedly waved his hand to stop him from speaking.

He spoke faster and continued: "As for the money confiscated from the Household Department, half a month later the Household Department will pay out 300,000 taels of silver to the inner court in the name of palace consumption."

Wei Guangde could imagine that if the inner court really provided money, let alone Feng Bao, maybe not even the young emperor Zhu Yijun and the two empresses would agree, let alone Feng Bao.

But Wei Guangde comes from a later generation, and what he is best at is knowing what "flexibility" means.

It’s still said in the movie, “The rich’s money will be returned in full, and the poor’s money will be divided into 30 and 70.” What the court wants to collect is the money from the clan and nobles, not the emperor’s money.

"As long as the palace has money on the surface, it will be easy to deal with the clans later.

If the Ministry of Household Affairs collects too much money, wouldn't it be easy to say that the palace needs to withdraw money from the Ministry of Household Affairs? "

Wei Guangde continued to seduce.

Although Feng Bao was not here, Zhang Juzheng was the one who passed the words to Feng Bao's ears, and it was the same.

As long as Feng Bao understands the meaning, he will not object if he thinks about it. With his intelligence, he will not fail to understand the benefits of this matter to the inner court and the imperial court.

The Imperial Villa of the Ming Dynasty was probably first built in the Yongle period, and was also called "Gongzhuang".

It is located in Fengrun County, Shuntian Prefecture, and is called Renshou Guanzhuang. During the Xuande period, Qingning and Weiyang palaces were successively built.

These palaces and villas cover a wide area, starting from Fengrun County in the northeast of Beizhili, going southwest through Baodi, Wuqing, Jinghai, and all the way to Hejian and other counties.

Afterwards, through the Tianshun, Chenghua and Hongzhi periods, the Ming Dynasty royal family controlled seven imperial villages, covering a total area of ​​more than 12,000 hectares.

However, after Emperor Zhengde succeeded to the throne, the number of imperial villages increased dramatically, reaching more than 30 with an area of ​​more than 37,000 hectares.

Zhang Ju said that there was no imperial village in the Ming Dynasty until he got down to business. In fact, it started in the Jiajing Dynasty.

In February of the second year of Jiajing, Xia Yan compiled the materials obtained from the inventory into "Inspection and Report to Huangzhuang" and submitted it to Emperor Shizong. He explained in detail the number, geographical distribution and harm of the establishment of Huangzhuang, and recommended that the Huangzhuang be abolished and the land returned to the people. Eliminate all the disadvantages caused by Huangzhuang.

Seeing this, Shizong issued an edict: "Each palace, village, farmland, and grains of silver will still be paid to the Jie Department, and they will be put into use at the end of the year.

The number of acres must be changed to official land according to the new registration, and it does not need to be called Huangzhuang. "

Later, he issued an imperial edict: "Return all the people in charge of the village."

What does it mean? In fact, it is to change the management model of Huangzhuang back to the ancestral system, and the local government will be responsible for managing these fields, including rent collection.

Naturally, the expenses in the palace can be obtained from the Ministry of Household Affairs, as much as needed, so there is no need to buy fields and collect rent to live by oneself.

Therefore, nominally since the Jiajing period, the imperial palace of the Ming Dynasty has ceased to exist.

But in fact, these imperial estates returned to the control of the inner court thirty years after Jiajing.

The reason is also very simple. The emperor's Taoism and alchemy were too expensive. He asked the Ministry of Household Affairs for money before, but the Ministry of Household Affairs refused. So the Chief of Ceremony naturally thought that he should control his own financial resources.

Therefore, Huangzhuang, which was one of the incomes of the inner court, naturally returned to their eyes.

What's more, operating these industries is also beneficial to the people in the inner court.

Yan Song, the chief assistant in power at the time, turned a blind eye to this and allowed it to resurgence.

Up to now, the Imperial Village is still there, and it is managed by the eunuchs sent by the inner court. However, it is no longer called the Imperial Village to the outside world, but only manages the official land.

Zhang Juzheng blinked. He understood what Wei Guangde meant. Although he thought this seemed bad, it seemed to be the best solution.

Otherwise, as the world is today, it would be really difficult to collect taxes from the clan and nobles.

"Brother Uncle, as far as I know, the royal manors in various places are also the places with the most hidden fields."

Wei Guangde continued, "Whether it is the royal family or the nobles, they manage their own manors in the local area, and the local government is afraid to investigate, so they have the opportunity to occupy the land without reporting to the officials.

If the land is really measured according to the system, the amount of land in those manors will be increased by at least 50%.

If we can take the opportunity of measuring the manors to tax the manors, then my Ming Dynasty will not have to worry about finance and taxation a hundred years later."

Wei Guangde is still reminding Zhang Juzheng that if they only measure the land and do not take action on the manors of the royal family and the nobles, then the land will continue to be annexed in the future. After a few years or decades, the land that can pay taxes will be greatly reduced, and the results of their current land measurement will be in vain.

"Brother Uncle, in fact, we have not changed the ancestral system, but just implemented it according to the ancestral system.

As long as the imperial farms are willing to pay taxes, and with the introduction of the performance evaluation system by my uncle, as long as the court reiterates the rule that 'those who buy land from the royal family but do not pay taxes will lose their official positions', the local civil and military officials will naturally know what to do."

"Order the royal family to buy land and not pay taxes and lose their official positions, and the royal family's land will be collected by the officials, just like the meritorious officials."

This is the clear decree issued by Emperor Jiajing, but the decree was issued, but it was not seriously implemented below, because there was too much resistance.

It was still the 39th year of Jiajing, and Emperor Jiajing had already felt the horror of the number of farms of the royal family and meritorious officials, so he issued a decree to set a limit on the number of farms of meritorious officials, and the excess part was confiscated.

Emperor Jiajing directly sent the censor Shenyang to clean up the farms that were seized, concealed and embezzled, totaling more than 16,000 hectares.

Muzong followed the advice of the censor Wang Tingzhan and set a limit that would decrease from generation to generation: meritorious officials were limited to 200 hectares of land for five generations, and relatives of the emperor were limited to 700 to 70 hectares.

However, it was only then that the court learned that although Emperor Jiajing abolished the imperial farms in name, the farms and fields belonging to the emperor still existed.

The Xingwangfu Wangzhuang alone had more than 8,300 hectares of land in the six farms and two lakes of Chengtian, which was led by eunuchs and allowed to be merged by schools. So far, 880 hectares have been added and divided into 12 farms.

It is hard to say that the more than 30,000 hectares of imperial farms inherited by Emperor Jiajing from his cousin Emperor Zhengde, the original land of the Xingwangfu alone was close to 10,000 hectares.

In fact, the imperial farms inherited from Emperor Jiajing during the Longqing period had exceeded 40,000 hectares.

Although Emperor Jiajing put a sudden brake on this round of land annexation that started with Emperor Zhengde, it was obviously not effective.

Of course, Emperor Jiajing later gave the original Wangzhuang of Xingwangfu to King Jing and a lot of land.

After King Jing died, except for the farmland of Prince Xing, all other newly incorporated farmland was returned under the auspices of Xu Jie, but the farmland managed by the Imperial Household Department still had more than 40,000 hectares.

Well, we can only say that the biggest landlord in the world is actually the emperor.

The princes are also big landlords, but they are still not as arrogant as the emperor.

"That's it for now. I'll discuss it with Shuanglin in the next two days."

Wei Guangde's idea is actually very good, which is of great benefit to the inner court and the court.

However, the difficulty of getting the palace to pay money is mainly due to face.

"Brother Shu, remember to remind Brother Shuanglin that those 'official fields' should pay taxes and labor."

Wei Guangde emphasized that he must make it clear to Feng Bao that the fields that pay taxes are 'official fields', not 'imperial farms'.

With this distinction, it will naturally not affect the emperor's face.

Zhang Juzheng nodded and said goodbye to go back to his duty room. As soon as he reached the door, Wei Guangde seemed to have thought of something. He caught up with Zhang Juzheng in two steps and whispered in his ear: "If the palace hesitates, the silver allocated by the Ministry of Revenue to the inner court can be doubled according to the amount of tax paid by those official fields.

There are hundreds of princes and dukes in the country. The fields of the princes alone are probably no less than one million hectares, and there are also those nobles.

If the court can really get this money back, the Ministry of Revenue will really not lack silver."

Before, Wei Guangde roughly estimated based on official figures that the fields owned by the royal family and nobles are estimated to be more than two million hectares. In addition, if all the hidden fields in the private sector are found through surveying, the Ministry of Revenue will probably increase millions of taels of cash every year.

Wei Guangde can calculate this account, and Zhang Juzheng naturally knows it.

He didn't say anything, just nodded slightly.

Afterwards, Wei Guangde didn't want to continue analyzing.

"Lu Bu."

After calling out to the door, Wei Guangde sat back at the desk.

"Master, you called me."

Lu Bu walked in quickly and bowed in front of him.

"Send all these documents back to Wenyuan Pavilion."

Wei Guangde pointed to the documents that had been reported back earlier and ordered, including those he had picked out.

The paper he had written on had already been taken away by Zhang Juzheng, and it was not appropriate to keep these documents here, so it was better to send them back.

"By the way, Master."

Just as Lu Bu was about to pick up the documents and send them away, he suddenly stopped and said to Wei Guangde: "Master, the lotus pond flowers bloomed this morning, two months earlier than in previous years, and the flowers are more beautiful.

If you are tired, you can go to the lotus pond and take a walk to see the white lotus to relax."

"Haha, the lotus flowers are blooming, this is rare, I'll go and see them later."

Wei Guangde laughed after hearing this.

However, a lot of time was wasted today, and Wei Guangde's room has accumulated a lot of official documents that need to be dealt with.

That being said, in the end, of course, the matter was completely forgotten.

No matter how hard I tried, I still couldn't finish processing today's memorials.

However, Zhang Juzheng seemed to be worried about what he had said before, so no one came to inform the cabinet that there was a small meeting in front of Sanya today.

When the time came, Wei Guangde asked Lu Bu to clean up the room and left the cabinet.

Walking to his sedan, Wei Guangde told the attendant beside the sedan: "Go and ask Zhang Ji to wait for me at the house in Baodafang. We will go there too."

"Yes, sir."

The Changsui obeyed the order, agreed, and ran quickly into the distance.

When the bearer saw Wei Guangde walking to the front of the sedan, he naturally raised the back of the sedan to make it easier for Wei Guangde to get on the sedan.

Wei Guangde did not plan to go back to his hometown directly today. Firstly, he had been annoyed by the officials in the capital these days and wanted to hide in peace. Secondly, he had other things to ask Zhang Ji to do.

Soon, when Wei Guangde's sedan arrived at Baodafang's outer house, Zhang Ji was already waiting at the door of the compound.

"Come in with me."

When Wei Guangde got off the sedan, he saw Zhang Ji. He just said something and walked towards the house.

After entering a small room in the inner house, Wei Guangde said: "I have something to arrange for someone to do. It must be done secretly. There must be smart and trustworthy people in the house."

"Master, there are a few in the outer city. They were all adopted from the mountain behind Bengshan Castle in the early years."

Zhang Ji whispered.

"Oh, when did they come?"

Wei Guangde knew that the mountain behind Bengshan Fort was a paradise, a small village, filled with gangsters who had not registered with the government.

“I came here a few years ago, and the people have already changed.

I remember telling the master about this matter, but the master said to ask the madam to take care of it. "

Zhang Ji hurriedly explained that he was afraid that Wei Guangde would misunderstand that it was his problem and did not report it to him in time.

"I forgot all about it."

Of course, Wei Guangde knew about the people sent from Houshan. In addition to cultivating the fields, those people were actually the place where his father raised the dead soldiers.

Don't talk about why a hundred households need to support dead people. In fact, anyone who plans for their own family will secretly support such people.

Who knows when you will encounter a troublesome opponent. If you can't defeat him head-on, you can only use black hands to eliminate him physically.

"Listen to me, do you still remember Cheng Shoujie?"

"Cheng Shou. That Dali Temple Cheng?"

When Wei Guangde asked, Zhang Ji quickly remembered this person.

"That's him. He's from Caozhou, Shandong. You arrange for someone to go over and keep an eye on his family, especially his sons, and check if there are any account books or other things hidden in his home."

Wei Guangde whispered.

"The master is saying that he may have hidden the account book!"

Zhang Ji was a little surprised, then nodded, "Master, if it is true, do you want it?"

Speaking of this, Zhang Ji made a cutting motion with his palm.

"Observe for a while first to see if anyone else is watching near his house, and then spy on the situation in the mansion.

You need to arrange for smart people to go over, so as not to alert others.

The people from the back mountain also brought a few over, mainly just in case.

It’s best if nothing is left behind, and if there is anything, it must not be exposed. "

Wei Guangde whispered. (End of chapter)