Zhang Juzheng (1525—1582) was born in Jiangling, Hubei Province. Jiajing Jinshi, Qin Long first year (1567) into the cabinet. Mu Zong died, and he conspired with eunuch Feng Bao to chase the high arch and record it for him. In the early years of Wanli, Shenzong was young, and he presided over all state affairs. He was a resourceful and monopolized state affairs for ten years. He was the most authoritative record in the Ming Dynasty and a rare politician in the late feudal society of China. During the period of administration, in the face of corrupt official management, financial crisis, uneven taxation and lax military morale, he used his power to vigorously carry out a series of reforms and achieved certain results. The main contents of Zhang Juzheng's reform are as follows: ① Rectify the bureaucracy. Zhang Juzheng witnessed the chaotic political situation during the reign of Jia and Long, and thought that the crux of the problem was the corruption of bureaucracy. Bureaucrats "stole their reputation in vain" and "loved evil and attacked each other". As a result, the bureaucracy was unclear and corrupt officials did harm, so the urgent task to save the time was to refresh politics. In the first year of Wanli (1573), the examination method was put forward. Its method is to assess step by step, and pass the examination with the matter. "Fu-press is used to check whether it is an official's merit or not, and the official department is used to avoid the product flow of Fu-press, and the court is used to observe the algae of the official department." ("The Complete Works of Zhang Wenzhong" is played out. 5) The Ministry of Education examines and presses, the Ministry of Education is supervised by six departments, and the Cabinet supervises six departments. Implement mutual restraint and supervision to improve the power of the cabinet. At the same time, restrain the eunuch power, put in order study politics, strengthen the control of students, reuse talents, and eliminate "redundant employees". As a result, the efficiency of administrative work has been improved, and the central government decree "although outside Wan Li, it is pursued downwards and in the evening" (Ming History, Volume 213, Biography of Zhang Juzheng). (2) put in order frontier defense, improve ethnic relations. Zhang Juzheng's policy of maintaining stability and border defense is "foreign affairs, internal repair and war defense". At that time, the focus of the northern defense was in Jizhou. In the first year of Qin Long, Tan Lun and Qi Jiguang, the famous imperial Japanese soldiers, presided over the defense of Jizhou. Qi Jiguang stepped up training with Zhejiang soldiers who had fought against Japan as the backbone. According to the geographical conditions of Jizhou and the operational characteristics of Mongolian soldiers, he decided to use chariots and fight with steps and riding. He also repaired the Great Wall and built more than 1, enemy platforms, greatly strengthening the defense forces. Qi Jiguang put in order's border work has been strongly supported by Zhang Juzheng, thus ensuring the safety of the north. In Liaodong, after Wang Chonggu and Fang Fengshi trimmed the side wall and opened up wasteland, the strength of fighting and defending was also strengthened. At this point, the long-standing situation of "the enemy is suffering from the Japanese, and the border affairs are wasted for a long time" has been reversed. On the basis of border defense consolidation, Zhang Juzheng also improved the relationship between the Ming Dynasty and the Mongols through peace talks. Armistice, mutual trade, "naturally rest on the border, from Yanshui in the east to Jiayu in the west, seven towns are thousands of miles away, the army and the people are happy, and there is no need for military reform, saving seven years." ("Ming History" Volume 222 "Biography of Wang Chonggu") ③ Live within our means and cut expenses. In order to save the financial crisis at that time and maintain the balance of national financial revenue and expenditure, on the one hand, Zhang Juzheng cut down redundant officials and expenses, and saved the expenses of the royal family. On the other hand, we should strictly urge the collection of land tax and clean up the arrears. In the early years of Wanli, it was ordered that "the rent should be removed from Qin Long before the change of Yuan, and three levies and seven levies should be exempted four years ago". In the second year of Wanli (1574), among the seven points in arrears, three points were collected every year. In the second year, it was also decided that "those who fail to lose the amount should be corrected according to the caress, and the counties should listen to the tune". And use the test method to strictly urge officials to follow it. After some rectification, the financial income of the Ming dynasty improved. (4) measure the land, hit the strongmen. In the fifth year of Wanli, the land was ordered to be cleared, and all fields, such as farmlands, private fields, vocational fields, swinging fields and grazing lands, were measured and measured, and it was limited to three years. In the nine years of Wanli, the Qing dynasty was basically completed, and the number of fields in the country was more than 7.1 million. It has played a certain inhibitory role in hiding land from powerful landlords. ⑤ Reform the service system and implement a whip method (see "A Whip Method"). Zhang Juzheng's reform was a reform movement carried out by the feudal rulers of Ming Dynasty in order to save the ruling crisis of weakness and poverty after the middle of Ming Dynasty. After the reform and rectification, the class contradictions were temporarily eased, the social economy was relatively restored and developed, the treasury was full of money and grain, and the frontier defense forces were strengthened, thus achieving the goal of enriching Qiang Bing.
Zhang Juzheng's reform was a series of reforms carried out by Zhang Juzheng, a politician in the middle of Ming Dynasty, to save the Ming Dynasty.
in the middle of Ming dynasty, the situation of land annexation by aristocratic landlords was quite serious. In Jiangnan, some big landlords occupy 7, hectares of land.
in the imperial court, Xu Jie and his family occupied 24, mu of land. About half of the land paid taxes in the country is hidden by big landlords, and
refusing to pay taxes has seriously affected the national income. The aristocratic landlords plundered the land crazily, and the feudal exploitation was further aggravated by drama, which aroused the sharpening of social contradictions, and Deng Maoqi, Liu Tong, Lan Tingrui, Liu Liu and Liu
seven peasant uprisings occurred one after another. The Ming dynasty was in a dangerous situation.
how can feudal rule be maintained? Some people in power in the landlord class believe that politics must be reformed to find a way to save themselves. In this situation, Zhang Juzheng's reform measures have been carried out.
Zhang Juzheng (1525? In 1582, he was born in Jiangling, Hubei Province.
During the Wanli period in Ming Shenzong, he served as the first assistant (prime minister) of the Cabinet for 1 consecutive years. The measures he took mainly include:
In the internal affairs, he first rectified the bureaucracy and strengthened the centralized system. Zhang Juzheng created the "Examination Method", strictly
inspected the implementation of imperial edicts by officials at all levels, required regular reports on local political affairs to the cabinet, enhanced the real power of the cabinet, removed
die-hard officials who were conformist and opposed to change, and selected and promoted new forces to support the reform, thus making
organizational preparations for the implementation of the new law. In addition, postal service and civil service were rectified, and his policy was: "respect sovereignty, teach officials, reward and punish, give orders" and "strengthen public office and interfere with private affairs."
in terms of economy, Zhang Juzheng's achievements are the most outstanding. He once used Pan Jixun, a famous hydraulic scientist, to supervise and repair the Yellow River, so that
the Yellow River no longer flows south into the Huai River, so "all fields and land have been left out, and abandoned land for decades has been turned into ploughing mulberry", and the Caohe River can also go directly to Beijing
.
"One Whipping Method" is an important content of Zhang Juzheng's economic reform, and it is also a major change in the history of feudal society in China.
the tax system in the early Ming dynasty was very complicated. At that time, the taxes were mainly grain, supplemented by silver silk, and were collected in summer and autumn.
In addition, farmers are required to take all kinds of corvees and pay special taxes. The content of "one whip method" is:
"Summarize the taxes and levies in a county, measure the land and measure the amount, levy all the money, decompose the officials, and hire the servants to deal with it." That is, the land
tax, corvee and other miscellaneous levies in all counties and counties are always one, and the silver is combined and paid according to the conversion of mu, which greatly simplifies the collection procedures and makes it difficult for local officials to cheat. The implementation of this method enables farmers who have no land to relieve the burden of labor, and farmers who have fields < P > can spend more time cultivating land, which has played a certain role in developing agricultural production. At the same time, changing the corvee
to collect silver, farmers gained greater personal freedom and were easier to leave the land, which provided
more labor sources for urban handicrafts. Industrial and commercial people who have no land can choose not to invest in silver, which will also play a positive role in the development of industry and commerce.
The implementation of the "one whip method" has significantly increased the revenue of the Ming government and improved the financial and economic situation. The national treasury has more than 13 million stones of grain, which can be eaten in five or six years, which is a great progress compared with the situation that the national stock of grain was not enough for one year during Jiajing period.
Zhang Juzheng has also taken some military reform measures. He sent Qi Jiguang to guard Jiyumen, and Li Zhiliang town Liaodong, and built more than 3, "enemy platforms" on the Great Wall from Shanhaiguan in the east to Juyongguan in the west. He also entered
tea-horse trade with Dahan Tatar and adopted a peaceful policy. Since then, the border defense in the north has been more consolidated, and there was no major war between the Ming Dynasty and Tatar < P > cymbals in twenty or thirty years.
after the above reforms, the centralized feudal state machine was strengthened, and "laws must be enforced" and "words must be effective" were basically realized. The country's economic situation has improved, its fiscal revenue has increased, and its ability to resist aggression has been enhanced in national defense. Of course, the purpose of Zhang Juzheng's advocacy of reform was not to reduce the burden on the people, but to consolidate the feudal rule of the Ming Dynasty. Therefore, his political reform could not touch the fundamental interests of the landlord class, and he could only make some tinkering improvements, which could not save the historical general trend of the inevitable demise of feudal society. Nevertheless, the reform in Zhang Juzheng limited the vested interests of the big bureaucratic landlords to a certain extent.
In June p>1582, Zhang Juzheng died of illness, and some reformed opponents regrouped and made a crazy counterattack. They attacked Zhang Juzheng's reform, saying that clearing Zhang's land was "increasing taxes and harming the people" and implementing "one whip method" was a mess of the "ancestral system". They ordered the revocation of Tega's official rank and titles when Zhang Juzheng died, and then raided his property.
Zhang Juzheng's eldest son was forced to commit suicide, and other family members were also persecuted. The feudal die-hards who represent the big landlords and big noble forces have taken power again, and the life of the working people is even more painful.
In China's feudal society, there were many emperors who rose to the throne from the common people. Both Liu Bang and Zhu Yuanzhang were famous as the founding monarchs, but there were few prime ministers who came from humble origins and saved the day. Zhang Juzheng was a rare one. He rose from a scholar, a juren, a scholar, an official to a cabinet university, and rose from the common people. In the early years of the Wanli Dynasty of the Ming Dynasty, he served as a ten-year-old assistant, helped the ten-year-old emperor to carry out reforms, and managed the declining and chaotic Ming Dynasty to make the country rich and the people safe. People praised him as the "prime minister who saved the time" (1).
"Saving the time" is highly praised, which not only shows that he was a great politician who was in danger when the dynasty was in decline, but also made a name for himself in the history books with his extraordinary measures of inspiring the world. His brilliant achievements are comparable to those of Shang Yang and Wang Anshi as the three most famous reformers in the early, middle and late feudal society in China.
The reform took place from the first year of Wanli in the late Ming Dynasty to the tenth year (1573-1582), when Zhang Juzheng was the first official. This is an eventful year for the country, but in this particular era in the 16th century, it is not only the decline of a surname dynasty, but the decline of the whole feudal system. At the end of the dynasty, some politicians tried their best to revive the decline, but in the end of the feudal society, only Zhang Juzheng succeeded in reviving the aging system with the power of saving the day. The history of China at the end of the 16th century gave him a different background and opportunity from previous reforms.
China's feudal autocratic system lasted for more than 1,6 years from Qin and Han dynasties to the end of Ming dynasty. It not only has the process of creation and perfection, but also develops in the repeated shocks of continuous strengthening and weakening. How many peasant uprisings overthrew one dynasty after another, causing the paralysis of feudal rule again and again, and the feudal autocratic system still survived and developed, and it was strengthened more and more in the later period of feudal society. In the Ming Dynasty, political centralization reached unprecedented strength, and even the power of the prime minister was owned by the emperor, so later generations regarded the Ming Dynasty as a dynasty with extremely developed feudal absolutism. However, in the last years of this highly strengthened autocratic dynasty, the scene of decline far exceeded that of the late Han, Tang and Song dynasties. Such an extremely strengthened and extremely weakened situation was born in the beginning and end of the same dynasty, which was unprecedented in previous dynasties. This phenomenon of alternating strength and weakness reflects the insurmountable contradictions in the feudal autocratic system itself, which indicates that the feudal autocratic system has been plagued by many diseases, and it is dying if it does not advance.
Zhang Juzheng stepped onto the political stage at this critical moment of historical development, leaving behind his legendary life.
This peasant boy from Jiangling, Hubei Province, has been famous as a child prodigy in his village since childhood. At the age of ten, he read the four books and five classics thoroughly, and at the age of thirteen, he wrote the quatrain of "Singing Bamboo":
Green is everywhere outside Xiaoxiang, and the forest is sparse and jade is cold;
the phoenix hair is full of strength and straight up to the pole.
at an early age, he used bamboo as a metaphor, which showed his great ambition in his youth. This year, he could have won the exam. Gu *, the governor of Huguang, who was the examiner, saw this young man's extraordinary and deliberately made him lose the election, which made him suffer setbacks and encouraged him to forge ahead even more. Sure enough, three years later, Zhang Juzheng tried again and became famous at the age of 16, becoming the youngest juren. Gu * was very happy after knowing it, and immediately took off the jade pendant he was wearing and gave it to him, encouraging him to become a talented person in the auxiliary country.
Zhang Juzheng's young man was successful, and he entered the cabinet in his prime. He was resourceful and wise. Ming Tong Jian said: "When the treasury is full, the country is the richest", "Rise and fall, strengthen the discipline, improve the discipline, and live in the right place." This is a fair evaluation of him by Qing people. However, in the eyes of people at that time, there were many reputations, and people commented on his merits and demerits, and many people attacked each other and covered each other. In the notes of Ming and Qing Dynasties, such as Wan Li Ye Bu Bian, Yong Zhuang Xiao Pian, Five Miscellaneous Notes, Notes on Dingling, and Posting in the Garden, there are some criticisms, some excuses, and some comments on whether Zhang Juzheng framed his friends and accepted bribes,
colluded with the prison, whether his two sons won the first place and the second place in a row, and so on.
His personal ending was as bumpy as that of Shang Yang, Wang Anshi and other reform predecessors. If all this is not uncommon in the experience of reformers in past dynasties, it is intriguing that it was Zhang Siwei, his hand-picked and reused successor, who led to the "whipping of the corpse" behind him, and Zou Yuanbiao, the official department minister, who was disabled by his court staff, who rehabilitated him. Such an ironic ending is unheard of in the history of China's reform.
why did history give him such a dislocation? !
II. Ordered at a critical moment
The Ming Dynasty was a dynasty with extremely developed feudal autocracy. Its ruling system leads to the abuse of absolute power of the monarch and corrupt bureaucracy. Since the establishment of the feudal society, the emperor had the supreme autocratic power in handling state affairs. In the early Ming Dynasty, he took back the power of the prime minister, and set up the cabinet records as the secretary of the emperor's affairs. All the chapters were examined and approved by the emperor himself, and no one was allowed to ask. Whenever a major event or doubt is broken, the liegeman can only listen to the purport in person, and everything is centralized in the emperor. The power of the monarch is highly inflated, surpassing all previous dynasties.
When things develop to the extreme, they often go to the opposite side. The high concentration of power brings a more extravagant lifestyle to the royal family, which erodes their minimum ability to manage state affairs and nourishes generations of confused emperors. After the middle of the Ming Dynasty, it became a routine for the emperor not to visit the DPRK. Emperor Jiajing lived in the inner palace, cultivated immortality and practiced Taoism, and ignored politics for 3 years. Emperor Qin Long was in office for six years, and rarely approved official documents. In case of state affairs, he let his ministers dispute and said nothing. Some people thought he was dumb. At the beginning of the country, there were strict courtesies in the court, and officials were punished if they were slightly rude, and even led to death. The ministers were all on tenterhooks and did not dare to slack off. After more than one hundred years, during the period of Qin Long, the courtiers had long been forgotten, and no one even made it clear how to advance and retreat. Occasionally, the ministers swaggered in the temple, making loud noises, spitting and blaspheming regal. This phenomenon was not only unprecedented in the history of feudal dynasties, but also did not reach this level in the late Qing Dynasty.
the emperor is a feudal expert.