Chapter 882 971 Silver Dollars

"Even if the matter of conferring a royal title on Duke Cheng Guo Zhu Xizhong is finalized, I will send a note to the Ministry of Rites and ask them to report the matter.

Zhang Juzheng, under the guise of the palace, asked Wei Guangde and Lu Tiaoyang to choose silence on this matter, and then he spoke.

Wei Guangde and Lu Tiaoyang both lowered their heads. Although they felt it was inappropriate to pursue a dead man, they knew they could not object.

At this point, the matter has been settled in the cabinet.

In the Ciqing Palace, Feng Baogang finished analyzing the results of the foreign court meeting and talked about the granting of the title to Duke Cheng Guo Zhu Xizhong. What he emphasized was that the cabinet believed that Zhu Xizhong had contributed to the rescue of Emperor Jiajing when he was on patrol in the south. .

In fact, strictly speaking, it was not Zhu Xizhong who really rescued him, but the long-dead Lu Bing. It was Lu Bing who snatched Emperor Jiajing out of the sea of ​​​​fire.

But since then, Zhu Xizhong has been protecting the emperor, and he can barely be considered as a guardian.

However, in the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Xizhong was Duke Cheng after all, so this credit was recorded for a long time as Zhu Xizhong and Lu Bing jointly rescued the emperor.

Especially after Lu Bing's death, no one would mention the detailed process. Thirty years have passed, and it is difficult to find anyone who was present at that time.

Since Feng Bao dared to harvest the money from the Duke's Mansion, he naturally had carefully considered the matter.

Speaking of Zhu Xizhong's pursuit of the title of king, except for the rescue effort in the 18th year of Jiajing, it seems that he can't find any other greater credit.

"There is no greater merit than rescuing the driver." Naturally, the contribution to rescuing the driver is the greatest, and everything else has to be put aside.

Because even as a king, he still has to bear the responsibility of the person who rescued him, so he naturally has to pay more attention to him, so his rescue effort is particularly extraordinary.

Among the hundreds of scholars in ancient China, Confucian culture undoubtedly occupies the most important position, so today we all refer to the famous ancient intellectuals as Confucian scholars.

In the two thousand years of feudal social rule, Confucian culture has always played a very important role. Although it has experienced ups and downs during this period, it was finally promoted to the most noble position during the period of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty. This is the "deposed Among hundreds of schools of thought, Confucianism is the only one respected.”

In the following thousand years, no matter how the dynasties changed, feudal rulers vigorously promoted Confucius' "benevolence", and Confucianism became the cornerstone for feudal kings to consolidate their rule. Confucianism was the so-called orthodox thought in feudal society.

Although in Confucianism, the merit of rescuing someone is actually nothing. Although the king seems to be the tallest and largest, there is an "existence" that is above the king, and this existence is the "Sheji".

"She" originally refers to the God of Earth, and "Ji" originally refers to the God of Grain, but She Ji together is used to refer to the country, or it can be expressed as the country passed down from the ancestors.

Since ancient times, "the state" has been more valuable than the king, so the contribution to saving the state should naturally be greater than the contribution to saving the king.

But it's still the same thing, favor. Saving the emperor is a huge debt of favor, and the emperor has to pay it back.

"Since the cabinet has this intention, then let's give Duke Cheng a title."

Empress Dowager Chen has always chosen to trust the cabinet on these matters. Since Feng Bao said so, there is no truth to it.

In fact, she only vaguely remembered that there seemed to be such a saying that Zhu Xizhong and Lu Bing saved Emperor Jiajing, and since then they have continued to be favored by the Holy Family.

"What my sister is saying is that since the late Duke Cheng Guo was instrumental in rescuing him, it is not a big deal to pursue him as a king."

Queen Mother Li also nodded and said.

In the Ming Dynasty, as long as people with different surnames were not granted the title of king alive, it was not a big deal in the eyes of the people in the harem, and there was no explicit prohibition in the ancestral system.

To put it bluntly, everything depends on the rules set by Zhu Yuanzhang. As long as they comply with the rules, it will be fine.

On the cabinet side, after Zhang Juzheng had made his decision and was about to end the cabinet meeting, Lu Tiaoyang suddenly said: "My lord, the chief minister, my lord the second minister, I saw a document handed over by the magistrate of Haicheng County, Fujian Province today. Official documents.

The article mentioned that barbarian ships came from the South China Sea, carrying a large amount of silver and overseas products to trade our Ming products. Since the port goods had been sold out, they purchased another batch of gold and left. "

"Huh? Exchanging silver for gold is considered a transaction, so what's wrong with it?"

Zhang Juzheng asked.

"Before the Ming Dynasty, the circulation of gold and silver was always prohibited. Although it was allowed to use both money and money during the Longqing period, gold trading was not allowed after all. When Haicheng County learned about this matter, it didn't know how to make a decision, so it reported it to the Ministry of Household Affairs."

Lu Tiaoyang opened his mouth to explain.

Hearing this, Wei Guangde also understood what Magistrate Haicheng was worried about, but at this time, he thought more about the chaotic Ming Dynasty Money Law.

Although China has a long history of using silver, in the Western Han Dynasty and before, silver was not a currency in circulation, but was mostly used in handicrafts and jewelry.

After the Eastern Han Dynasty, silver could occasionally be seen on the market as payment currency. This was due to the scarcity of gold and silver, which restricted precious metals such as gold and silver from becoming circulating currencies.

During the Qin and Han Dynasties, China actually implemented a single currency, which was made money, such as knife coins, five baht coins, etc. Only official money was legal tender.

In the Tang Dynasty, money and silk began to be used together, and coins such as "Kaiyuan Tongbao" were used. Silk fabrics such as "绫" and "绡" were used in large transactions.

The currency of the two Song Dynasties also followed the Tang Dynasty system and implemented the parallel standard system of money and silk. It was also based on making money. In the middle and later periods, paper money was added, namely Jiaozi, Huizi and Guanzi, but the settlement unit was still "Guan".

Although a small amount of copper coins were minted in the Yuan Dynasty, the currency circulation was soon determined to be mainly paper money, and its currency method went through three stages: Zhongtong Banknote, Zhiyuan Banknote, and Zhizheng Banknote.

The paper money of the Song Dynasty was very popular in the Yuan Dynasty, which was unimaginable to the Song people. The court began to issue Zhongtong Banknote and forced it to be used throughout the country.

In the Yuan Dynasty, paper money was the only legal currency. Gold, silver and copper coins were prohibited from use. Refusing to use paper money was a capital crime.

However, paper money was based on silver as a reserve currency. The so-called "silver and money are in balance". Paper money can be nominally exchanged for silver or even gold and silk. This destined that paper money is still anchored to physical objects, which restricted the issuance of paper money.

At the same time, the court rewarded not paper money, but gold, silver and other things, which made people unable to have enough confidence in paper money.

The paper money issued in the late Yuan Dynasty soon changed from using silver as a reserve at the beginning to the court directly deciding the issuance amount. At this point, paper money quickly fell into depreciation and entered a period of hyperinflation, and the credit of paper money was lost.

Zhu Yuanzhang chose to print the Ming Baochao, which was actually just a succession of the paper money from the Song and Yuan dynasties. Therefore, the Ming Dynasty also chose the policy of the Yuan Dynasty at the beginning, prohibiting the circulation of gold, silver and copper coins, and only allowing the use of Baochao.

However, due to the sharp depreciation of paper money in the Song and Yuan dynasties, while the Ming Baochao was in circulation, silver always had a place among the people, until a few decades later, the court had to relax the restrictions on the use of silver, and "the court and the public all used silver".

During the reign of Emperor Zhengtong Yingzong, the court implemented the system of paying taxes and converting them into silver, allowing people who did not serve in the army to pay silver instead, as well as the system of gold flower silver, which also opened the prelude to the silverization of the Ming Dynasty's finances.

The original meaning of gold flower silver is the best silver with full color and gold flowers, also known as silver with color or silver with Jingku. It is the silver collected from tax grain in the Ming Dynasty, which is mainly used for the emperor's reward and the monthly salary of military officers.

In the early Ming Dynasty, taxes were mainly collected in kind. Only the mining tax was gold and silver. Summer tax and autumn grain were converted into gold and silver only occasionally in Shaanxi and Zhejiang. All of them were sent to Nanjing to pay for military officials. The expenses of various border areas were also taken from them.

After Yongle moved the capital, officials in the capital had to take their salary cards to Nanjing to receive their salary rice. The journey was long and the cost was high. They would exchange rice for goods, buy high and sell low. Sometimes, a salary card of seven or eight stones could only be exchanged for one tael of silver, which was disadvantageous to both the people and the officials.

In the first year of Zhengtong, Deputy Chief Censor Zhou Quan suggested that in places where boats were not accessible in Nanzhili, Zhejiang, Huguang, and Jiangxi, tax grain should be converted into cloth, silk, and silver to be sent to Beijing as salaries. Jiangxi Governor Zhao Xin and Minister of Revenue Huang Fu also made requests one after another.

The Ming Dynasty then decided to collect more than four million stones of summer tax and autumn grain in Nanzhili, Zhejiang, Jiangxi, Huguang, Fujian, Guangdong, and Guangxi in silver.

Each stone of rice and wheat was converted into silver at 2.5 cents, a total of more than 1,012,700 taels of silver to be paid in Beijing's internal transport warehouse, and more than 250,000 taels were paid every quarter, which was called gold and silver.

During the Xuande period, Zhou Chen, the governor of Jiangnan, requested that the tax grain of the heavy official fields and the best households be converted into gold and silver, and each tael was equivalent to four stones of rice to be sent to Beijing as salary.

Later, this system was implemented in other provincial governments across the country as a permanent rule.

At this time, although the court still banned the circulation of silver, because silver was used as a medium for collecting taxes and labor during taxation, it actually tacitly accepted the monetary attributes of silver.

After Xuande, private transactions almost did not use treasure notes. During the Hongzhi and Zhengde periods, the government also used the accumulated money in the Taicang to pay official salaries many times, with a rate of 10%, 19 silver to 10 yuan.

From this, it can be seen that the Ming court had actually used silver as currency at this time.

By the Jiajing period, the use of silver had penetrated into all aspects of social life. Finally, in the eighth year of Jiajing, the court began to "use silver for taxation and official salaries", and the northern defense against Mongolia Altan "increased troops and garrisons, all paid with silver".

The court's silver receipts and expenditures increased more and more, and silver was getting closer and closer to legal tender. The fundamental reason was that the banknote law had completely rotted.

The Chenghua and Hongzhi periods were important turning points in the Ming Dynasty's finances. Unlike the occasional fiscal deficits in the early Ming Dynasty, the court's finances began to experience continuous expenditure crises during this period.

However, during this period, the court could still make up for the fiscal deficit by printing treasure notes when it was insufficient.

In the Jiajing period, treasure notes could not be spent at all, and only copper coins and silver accepted by the people could be used.

However, as for the treasure notes used to pay military salaries, the collapse of the treasure notes made it equivalent to no payment for the official army. Therefore, some border town officials and soldiers considered the cost of the journey and did not pay for four or five years, eight or nine years, or even for their entire lives.

But in any case, during this period, treasure notes could still be used to make up for the finances. However, Emperor Jiajing was a more pragmatic emperor. He knew that continuing to pay treasure notes to the people below might affect the stability of the imperial power, so he began to choose silver payment in accordance with public opinion and reduce the issuance of treasure notes.

This also became the fundamental reason for the huge deficit of the Jiajing Dynasty, and the old treasury was not enough even if the old treasury was exhausted.

Thinking of this, it was naturally a major event that Wei Guangde had been considering for a long time. He had no confidence that he could handle this matter well, and perhaps he could only pin his hopes on the person above.

Thinking of this, Wei Guangde couldn't help but glance at Zhang Juzheng, who was in the position of the chief minister.

He wanted to open his mouth, but he saw the assistant minister Lu Diaoyang from the corner of his eye. Wei Guangde finally planned to wait and discuss this matter with Zhang Juzheng in private.

And this matter was what Wei Guangde had been considering, to completely abolish the "Da Ming Baochao".

At this time, the Daming Baochao was still officially recognized by the Daming court in name, but in fact it had long been abandoned by the people and existed only as a medium for fiscal collection and ceremonial currency.

However, although it was abandoned by the people, the imperial court and local governments still regarded Baochao as an important part of the annual financial report. Even after the eighth year of Jiajing, the taxation with silver was only a part. The relevant salt tax, commercial tax, and customs tax still had a certain proportion of Baochao in the revenue and expenditure.

In Wei Guangde's view, this was a big loss of the imperial court's fiscal revenue.

If local governments could be completely prohibited from accepting Baochao when collecting taxes and all silver money could be used instead, the imperial court's revenue would be able to increase by tens of thousands of taels of silver.

However, most of these policies were formulated during the reigns of Chengzu and Xuanzong to save Baochao. After printing and issuing a large amount of Baochao, a part of Baochao was appropriately recovered to stabilize the value of Baochao.

These policies have become the so-called "ancestral system", which is difficult to change.

At least, Wei Guangde does not think he has the ability to change.

It's not that the reason is not sufficient. In fact, when Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang formulated the Baochao policy, he never thought about recycling these papers.

Since there was no such plan during the reign of Emperor Taizu, the subsequent policies were against the ancestral system, and it was only natural to abolish them now.

Changing all the treasure notes that the Ministry of Revenue was still collecting every year into cash can naturally increase fiscal revenue, real silver.

So, after Lü Diaoyang got up and said goodbye, Wei Guangde stayed on the pretext of something.

"Shan Dai, what else do you want?"

When Zhang Juzheng asked this question, he was actually uneasy in his heart. He was also worried that Wei Guangde would discover his conspiracy with Feng Bao.

Once the matter was exposed to Ciqing Palace, they would be in trouble.

However, Zhang Juzheng was relieved when Wei Guangde expressed his thoughts. It was good that their plan was not discovered.

"Since the printing of treasure notes was stopped in the Xuande Dynasty, the amount of treasure notes collected by the court every year is still not much. Is it necessary to completely abandon it?"

Zhang Juzheng did not think that Wei Guangde's idea had much benefit. Even if it could increase a little silver money for the court, it would be equivalent to removing the last fig leaf of the Ming Dynasty treasure notes.

He didn't want to touch the mess left by Taizu.

"Uncle, the current predicament of the court cannot be solved overnight. There is no other way but to increase revenue and reduce expenditure.

I have also read the article "Making Money with Great Aspects" by Uncle, 'It is the way to make money to save money.'

Unfortunately, the court spends too much and cannot make a surplus at all. For this reason, it can only find ways to collect all the money that should be collected.

In Shandai's opinion, the use of treasure notes to pay taxes can be completely abandoned.

At the beginning, Taizu discovered the treasure notes, mainly because of the shortage of copper materials in our Ming Dynasty. Printing treasure notes facilitates the circulation among the people. As for the future, that is another story.

Although copper materials are still in short supply today, what you said just now made me brighten my eyes. Now that overseas silver is pouring in, the court is making money. It seems that silver can be used to make money."

The silver money that Wei Guangde mentioned is not the silver and money circulating in Ming Dynasty at this time, but the plan to make silver dollars directly in Ming Dynasty. (End of this chapter)