Chapter 238: Reputation

Only by relocating these bigwigs northward, and then appointing officials of his own choosing to control the prefectures and counties, would the Donglin bloc—with its fusion of politics and commerce—lose its foundation and inevitably wither away.

As for the birth of new interest groups, under the constraints of a strict oversight mechanism, it would be hard for them to reach the scale and harm of the current Donglin Faction.

Zhu Youjian told no one of his plan to move the Nanjing government north—not even the imperial relatives in charge of construction. The building of residences was carried out under the banner of expanding the capital, and even if anyone suspected anything, they would never guess at such an astonishing move by the Emperor in the future.

The idea of dissolving the Nanjing government would certainly be welcomed unanimously by the senior ministers in the capital. Toward such an aloof existence as the Nanjing government, the court officials had long felt nothing but disgust, yet at the same time they were helpless, because since the Chengzu Emperor, none of the successive Ming emperors—though some were dissatisfied with Nanjing—had ever possessed the courage and boldness to break the shackles of this second court.

The colleagues in the various ministries and courts of Nanjing simply scoffed at certain directives and policies from the central court, countless times directly slapping the face of the capital court, putting on an arrogant air of "come and fight us if you dare."

As long as the court intended to punish some high official in a Nanjing ministry, it was like poking a hornet's nest—immediately countless memorials of impeachment would be sent straight to the capital, with all sorts of abuse and attacks following, until the senior ministers in the capital had no choice but to hold their noses and withdraw their orders.

As for the selection of chief officials at all levels after the merger of the ministries and courts of the two capitals, of course the method of "heavy on the north, light on the south" would be adopted—all those from Nanjing would serve as deputies. But the titles would not change; everyone was a senior minister, and at the very least face had to be given. As for substance—forget it.

Zhu Youjian planned to adopt a new official system: establishing Left and Right Ministers.

For example, in the Ministry of Personnel, the current Minister of Personnel, Zhou Yun, would become the Left Minister, and the Nanjing Minister of Personnel who would be merged in later would naturally be the Right Minister. Both would hold the rank of Minister, but in an era that honored the left as superior, everyone would understand who truly called the shots.

The Left and Right Vice Ministers would likewise each be two in number. The original court's Left and Right Vice Ministers would all become Left Vice Ministers, while the two coming from Nanjing would both be Right Vice Ministers.

Next year, when the Nanjing government moved north, the Ministry of Personnel would be the first to be dealt with, then the Ministry of War, the Ministry of Revenue, the Censorate, and other important ministries one by one.

In Zhu Youjian's plan, if next year's war against Jianzhou achieved decisive results, then Nanjing's forty-nine guard stations would no longer have any reason to exist. He would issue an edict abolishing all guard stations throughout the Great Ming, canceling the hereditary military household system, and converting all military households to civilian households.

With internal troubles and external threats basically eliminated, the guard station system—existing in name only—would have no further reason to exist.

The exploitation and various restrictions suffered by hereditary military households over two hundred years would be completely abolished. The lands of guard stations everywhere, after being surveyed, would be distributed to each military household family, following the same method Sun Chuanting had used in Xi'an: reserving a certain amount of land for senior guard officers, distributing the rest to households, and then supporting it with various policy measures.

Military households would go from renting their superiors' fields to owning fields of their own—this would unleash the productive enthusiasm of a vast number of military households across the nation to the greatest degree, vastly increasing the grain output of the entire Great Ming. Especially in the fertile Jiangnan region, Nanjing's forty-nine guard stations alone occupied tens of millions of mu of land, and most of the output from these lands belonged to the various levels of guard officers, while the military households, after a year of hard toil, barely had enough to fill their stomachs.

In fact, large numbers of military households had long since broken through the court's nominal restrictions, secretly engaging in various industries until they were no different from ordinary civilian households. The guard officers, aside from their titles, were no different from landlords and local tyrants.

Policies such as abolishing the guard station system and equalizing land distribution were essentially the same in nature as the later generations' "overthrow the local tyrants and divide the land"—the only difference being that the government was now the one leading it, and the methods might be relatively gentler.

As long as the guard officers knew which way the wind blew, everything could be settled amicably. But if anyone dared to gather a crowd and make trouble, the Xi'an Left Guard was the best example.

As for the reform of abolishing the guard stations, Zhu Youjian planned to entrust it to Sun Chuanting. Sun Baigu had already gained considerable experience in this area, and with his decisive and ruthless character, plus having the Emperor's backing and endorsement, he believed it could thoroughly resolve this chronic ailment of the Great Ming within a few years.

The policy of moving north would certainly meet with fierce opposition and resistance from some Nanjing officials and gentry. These shrewd characters would see through Zhu Youjian's purpose at a glance, and toward such a move that destroyed their very roots, how could this bunch of vested interests take it lying down?

As for what measures they might take to oppose his edicts, Zhu Youjian had not yet figured it out.

In his previous life, he had no experience in politics and no rich life experience. Although he knew he would encounter enormous resistance, he was unclear about the various tricks the other side might employ.

Since he was already prepared to burn bridges, he would just deal with each move as it came.

Open blades or hidden arrows—before overwhelming force, everything was but a phantom, but foam.

At that time, having Sun Chuanting bring over a Qin army would suffice—five thousand men should be enough. With the intelligence of the Embroidered Uniform Guard backing them up, dealing with Jiangnan literati who could only gather and curse and paste up posters everywhere should be no problem at all.

As for civil unrest—if one were to imitate the Manchu Qing's mass slaughter, civil unrest would be nothing to fear. But the army should still try as much as possible not to use force against civilians. Drawing swords and guns on unarmed compatriots—how would that be any different from the roving bandits?

If only there were urban management officers. Tsk tsk...

Sun Chuanting was no butcher either. With his abilities, dealing with that bunch of cultured hooligans in Jiangnan should be well within his grasp.

Against hooligans, present facts and reason; against literati, be simple and brutal; against cultured hooligans, use both methods at once.

First reason with them; if they won't submit, beat them until they do.

The hereditary nobles of Nanjing certainly would not dare to stick their heads out. Even if their own interests were harmed, these nobles—long lost in their soft beds of pleasure—had lost all their fighting spirit. Not to mention they had no military force in hand; even if they did, they would not dare to stand up, for otherwise their entire families would vanish from this world.

Zhu Youjian could not help but think: if he succeeded in this matter, fundamentally harming the interests of the Jiangnan gentry, then in later generations' unofficial histories he might be cursed until his flesh stank, and his reputation might well go down in history as eternally infamous.

Under the pens of these Jiangnan literati, his image could well be imagined—"the most tyrannical sovereign in history," "Chongzhen's downfall, the strongest empire," "Chongzhen the fatuous ruler of the Great Ming," "Return to the end of the Ming to kill the tyrant," and so on. In any case, they would write nonsense without regard for facts. To give readers their thrills, they could force things and spout pure garbage. And the people who spent money on such handwritten novels weren't cultured anyway—as long as it was entertaining, who cared whether it made sense?

Haven't you seen those braid dramas? The guards in the Forbidden City and the princes and princelings in the palace could all sneak into the harem to seduce the Emperor's women. The more such things ignored historical facts, the more people loved them. This was called cultural confidence—understand?

Did these brain-dead screenwriters not know what the harem was? Besides the Emperor, what other man could enter it? Those princes and princelings—once they came of age, they had to move out of the palace. What chance did they have to seduce their own father's women? These screenwriters were probably remnants of some other dynasty, depicting their own ancestors with an average IQ of no more than seventy. The descendants of the Aisin Gioro clan had nothing but shit in their brains—and yet plenty of brain-dead people loved the taste of shit.

Whatever. What mattered most was letting the common people benefit and letting society stride forward. "With cold brows I face a thousand pointing fingers"—whoever dares curse me, I'll beat them.

Reputation was a matter of opinion. He could also hire a bunch of ghostwriters to beautify his image—writing novels like "The Gentlest Chongzhen in History," "Chongzhen the Great Benevolent Sovereign," "The Tearful and Loving Chongzhen," "The Good Chongzhen Who Respects the Elderly and Cherishes the Young, Always Helping Fallen Old People," "Chongzhen the Great Emperor Closest to Historical Truth," and so on.

Although this kind of relatively realistic novel was not popular and wouldn't fetch a good price, at least it was honest to the readers who paid for it, letting them feel these novels weren't nonsense and wild fabrication, and also letting them know that even an emperor could not act willfully and recklessly—that he was not some gang boss who could chop off anyone's head on a whim.

Mm, let it be so.