Chapter 603: Commanderies and Counties, and Provinces

In the second year of Shaoming, on the Lantern Festival, among the envoys of the various states, Gao Baorong, heir of the Prince of Nanping, had arrived first and already stayed six months; the rest had likewise been waiting three or four months, and it was time for them to leave.

Zhang Zhao therefore personally hosted a banquet to send off the envoys of the various states.

Li Jingda of the Southern Tang had enjoyed himself immensely in the Eastern Capital, and during his stay had even personally joined a polo team there and become its biggest patron.

As for his other activities, such as buying properties in the Eastern Capital of Kaifeng and the Divine Capital of Luoyang, they could truly be called spending gold by the thousand.

The whole court of the Zhou state praised Li Jingda's bearing and his purchase of properties in the Eastern Capital and the Divine Capital, believing that the Li clan of the Southern Tang was preparing to come live in the Eastern Capital and the Divine Capital in the future.

But Zhang Zhao deeply suspected that Li Jingda's actions were merely Li Jing trying to lull him.

It was not that Zhang Zhao thought Li Jing had any great ambition, but rather that, judging from history, Li Jing still regarded the seat beneath his backside as extremely important.

Deep in his heart, Li Jing also had many misjudgments about his own abilities.

Historically, he had always believed himself to be a wise and brilliant ruler, and that it was only because the Zhou state was simply too strong that the loss of Huainan was merely bad luck.

Hmm, it had rather the flavor of "it's not that our troops didn't try hard, it's just that the enemy had Gundams."

With such a personality, Zhang Zhao would rather believe he was willing to run off to Hongzhou, shut the gates, and live a small life, than believe that while still holding half of Huainan he would voluntarily put on the appearance of coming to live in the Eastern Capital and the Divine Capital.

Therefore, when Zhang Zhao raised his cup to send off Li Jingda, he spoke with a double meaning.

"Go back and tell your elder brother: since he is a descendant of the Great Dynasty, he ought to know Our attitude toward the imperial clan of the Great Dynasty.

Holding a separatist corner is not advisable. If he sincerely returns to the state, We can entrust the affairs of Jiangnan to him. If he still wishes to hold his separatist corner, then even Hongzhou will not be safe."

Li Jingda was so frightened that cold sweat streamed down, and he stammered, not daring to speak.

Toward the envoy of Wuyue, Zhang Zhao was much gentler.

The Wuyue envoy Pei Jian was an old minister from the era of Qian Liu, and the Pei family was also a great clan of Jiangzuo. Adding to that Wuyue's consistent deference, Zhang Zhao was still unwilling to press too hard.

"The Two Zhes are a land of outstanding people and favorable geography; in the time of the Great Dynasty they were the seat of Jiangnan's literary brilliance.

King Wusu (Qian Liu) and King Zhongyi (Qian Yuanguan) were both loyal to the state, and We greatly admire them.

Your lord Yuanyou is still young; you senior ministers must guide him more, so that he does not forget the loyalty and righteousness of his ancestors.

We have bestowed a secret seal; take it back and give it to your king. If there is any matter at all, he may use the secret seal to inquire of Us."

Yuanyou was the courtesy name of Qian Zuo, King of Wuyue. Zhang Zhao's direct use of it was essentially treating Qian Zuo as a younger brother, and the bestowal of the secret seal carried even deeper meaning.

Zhang Zhao knew that in Wuyue the ministers were strong and the ruler weak, and that Qian Zuo was young. If there was any matter in which he could not control his subordinates, with this secret seal he could borrow Zhang Zhao's authority to stabilize his position.

And once Qian Zuo borrowed that authority, the distinction between superior and subordinate would be tamped down even more firmly. In the future, once the Southern Tang was gone, Qian Zuo would naturally have no choice but to offer up his whole state and submit.

This was also the historical matter of Qian Yue's submission to the Song dynasty, which gave Zhang Zhao ample confidence. He just did not yet know that Qian Zuo had only a few months of life left.

Upon hearing this, Pei Jian directly knelt and accepted the reward, then stood and drained his cup of wine. Regarding the strength of the Central Plains Great Zhou's military and Zhang Zhao's personal ability, Pei Jian gained an even deeper understanding.

In his view, the Great Zhou under a sage ruler had worthy civil officials and brave generals, and already possessed the momentum to unify all under heaven.

He decided that upon his return he would advise Qian Zuo to simply follow the snake up the stick and quickly solidify the situation of addressing the Shaoming Son of Heaven as brothers.

As for Gao Baorong, Zhang Zhao was even more amiable. He took Gao Baorong by the hand.

"We have heard that the Prince of Nanping is ill. We specially had the Imperial Medical Office select three famous physicians and a quantity of precious medicinal materials. Dechang may take them to Jiangling.

Baoying is willing to remain in the Eastern Capital to pursue his studies, which greatly pleases Our heart, and We will certainly supervise him."

Gao Baorong and his younger brother Gao Baoying also directly prostrated themselves. Among them, Gao Baoying had already caught the eye of Luo Siniang, and the Gao and Luo families had already arranged a marriage contract.

Last was Ma Xiguang. One could tell his character just by looking at him: round and simple, though not especially fat, that gentle countenance seemed to add a few catties of weight to him.

"We have heard that Brother Xiguang is going to Xuzhou to pay respects at the ancestral tombs. We have already notified Fan Quan, Military Governor of the Zhongwu Army in Xuzhou, to make arrangements, and the graves of the Ma ancestors have also been repaired and renewed.

We and Brother Xiguang felt like old friends at first meeting. The third month is the birthday of the Benevolent Empress Dowager, and Brother Xiguang must be present. You and I shall then drink a hundred cups in joy."

Ma Xiguang prostrated himself on the ground in gratitude, his voice choked with emotion. Zhang Zhao's treatment of him was truly beyond reproach.

Every few days there was a banquet bestowed upon him, and often treasures, utensils, and fine foods were granted as well. Ma Xiguang was also quite fond of polo, and Zhang Zhao even found time to personally teach him.

In Ma Xiguang's life, not even his elder brother Ma Xifan had treated him this well.

Moreover, a great matter had occurred during this visit of his. Through the careful comparison work of the Brocade Guard, they had finally found the former residence of the Ma ancestor Ma Yin, as well as several dozen surviving members of the Ma clan.

Ma Yin was a man of Xuzhou, and before his rise he had made his living as a carpenter. Zhang Zhao had not only found the Ma clan of Xuzhou, but also found the grandson of the craftsman who had taught Ma Yin the carpenter's trade back then.

Therefore, after the audience ended, Ma Xiguang still had to go to Xuzhou to receive the Ma clan. Although the journey would delay him by a month or two, Ma Xiguang felt it did not matter.

The next day, after the Lantern Festival banquet ended, Zhang Zhao immediately had the Secretariat draft an edict.

Enfeoff Ma Xifan as Prince of Chu, Honorary Grand Commandant, Secretariat Director, Military Governor of both the Wu'an and Wuping Armies, Chief Clerk of the Great Area Command of Tanzhou, with authority over all affairs of Tanzhou.

Enfeoff Qian Zuo as Prince of Wuyue, Honorary Grand Guardian, Military Governor of both the Zhendong and Zhenhai circuits, with authority over the affairs of eastern Zhe and western Zhe.

Enfeoff Gao Conghui as Prince of Jing, Honorary Grand Tutor, Chief Minister of the Secretariat-Chancellery, Military Governor of Jingnan, Governor of Jiangling Prefecture.

From this point on, the Zhang Zhou finally established suzerain-vassal relations with the four states of the Southern Tang, Ma Chu, Wuyue, and Nanping, and obtained a strong claim over these four states.

Among all the states under heaven, only Meng Shu and the Southern Han still called themselves Sons of Heaven.

Five days later, Feng Dao and Zhao Ying returned from the various prefectures and counties of Henan. The two brought back a great quantity of firsthand information about the grassroots level. Two days after that, the Brocade Guard from the covert lines also returned.

Zhang Zhao immediately ordered Liu Tao, Vice Director of the Secretariat, and Li Fang, Drafter of the Central Secretariat, to assemble the various Secretariat drafters to analyze and organize these two reports. After they had been formed into tables, Zhang Zhao finally understood the specific situation of the territory under his rule.

In fact, in the land of Henan, the situation of fortified villages being everywhere still existed only in the twelve prefectures of Meng, Huai, Zheng, Ru, Xu, Chen, Song, Cao, Shan, Yan, Hua, Chan, and Pu, which were close to Luoyang and Kaifeng.

This was because these twelve prefectures directly faced the threat of Khitan raids for grain and pasture, and had urgent security needs.

Although the remaining prefectures and counties also had fortified villages, they were purely folk associations for self-protection, and did not form firm personal dependency or personal oppression.

Moreover, after the court's political situation stabilized and there was no external threat, the fortified villages themselves were in a state tending toward dissolution.

Furthermore, the cultivated land among the people was not as scarce as Zhang Zhao had assumed. Apart from these prefectures and counties where fortified villages appeared in large concentrations, the cultivation situation in the remaining prefectures and counties was still acceptable.

From this, Zhang Zhao realized that the old village-official system and the newly emerging service-post system had not evolved independently, but rather changed along with changes in the central organizational structure.

Corresponding to the village-official system was the commandery-county system from the Qin through the Han, Wei, and Jin dynasties.

This commandery-county system, in the words of Gu Yanwu of the Ming dynasty, was called "its authority lies below."

That is, in the commandery-county system, the autonomous power of the commanderies and counties was too strong, and the court's only handle for intervening in the commanderies and counties was the single option of the commandery and county chief officials.

And what complemented the commandery-county system was the village-official system.

This caused the central dynasty to have to rely on, and even to some extent coax, the officials of the commandery, county, and village levels in order to complete the management of the commanderies, counties, and villages. The power of the localities was clearly too strong.

And the Military Governor provinces of the Tang, though different in outward form from the commandery-county system, were in substance part of the same broad category as the commandery-county system, and even as the powerful clans and great families of the Han, Wei, Jin, and Northern and Southern Dynasties.

In all cases, local power grew too strong, even forming a pattern fully capable of standing alone as a state.

And corresponding to this concentration of power below, there was also a concentration of power above.

That is, during the commandery-county period, although the central government could not deeply intervene in local structures, and driving local forces was no small problem.

Yet the benefits of the whole realm were too excessively concentrated at the central level.

This caused the wealth of the state to be mostly concentrated in the capital and in the Guanzhong and Heluo regions where the capital was located.

In later generations' terms, the center siphoned away everything from the localities, including tax revenue, talent, and so on.

This political structure caused enormous influence and damage in both the Han and Tang dynasties.

An important reason for the outbreak of the An Lushan Rebellion was, in fact, that the Li-Tang dynasty cared too much about Guanzhong and bled the localities far too excessively.

Otherwise, An Lushan alone, one barbarian lad, without the discontent and resistance of the entire Hebei stratum, could not have caused such great harm.

So for Zhang Zhao, the township-official system, no matter how many advantages it had, would be meaningless.

His greatest problem right now was to take back local power and prevent the situation of military-province fragmentation from appearing again, so he could not use the township-official system produced under extreme local centralization of power.

Then what was the upper political structure corresponding to the service-post system?

Naturally, it was the provincial system that sprouted in the Two Song dynasties, was brought to completion in the Yuan, and took fixed form in the Ming and Qing.

This system, under the name of Branch Secretariats, delegated part of the power to the localities in the form of authorization, but all governing authority belonged to the central government; the branch provinces were merely agents of the center.

While the court could always retain a portion of administrative, fiscal, military, and judicial authority, it also entrusted a considerable portion of power to the branch provinces, using the structure of the branch provinces to concentrate power in the center.

This was the future trend, and Zhang Zhao's great reform at the local level would also be put on the agenda.

(End of Chapter)

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