At the cabinet meeting on this day, the cabinet ministers almost unanimously took a stand against the establishment of the prefectural gentry council. Even Xu Guangqi, who has always supported Chongzhen in everything, also tactfully advised Chongzhen to think twice about setting up a county gentry meeting.

Although Zhu Youzhen had predicted that there would be many obstacles to the establishment of the county gentry council, such a strong opposition also surprised him.

However, he was still quite glad in his heart, thanks to the reform of the DPRK parliamentary system last year, so that he now only needs to deal with the eight or nine mouths in front of him, instead of facing hundreds of mouths at the DPRK meeting. Otherwise, a single sentence can drown him with spit.

Zhu Youzhen raised his right hand and said calmly: "Okay, okay, I have understood what everyone meant." What you are worried about is whether the local gentry will suppress the power of local officials to govern after the establishment of the county gentry council, making it difficult for the central government's decrees to pass through the localities in the future, and the local tyrants will rise up and repeat the old things of the two Han Dynasty. ”

Huang Liji immediately continued: "Since Your Majesty has understood the consequences of this matter, you should take advantage of the fact that this matter has not yet spread, and withdraw the discussion of the gentry meeting to discuss the establishment of the county gentry meeting. ”

Zhu Youzhen shook his head and said, "Take it back, why take it back." If the county gentry council is not established, will the decrees of the imperial court be able to pass through the localities? Don't you gentlemen, don't you know that the imperial power does not go to the countryside, this is the reality of my Ming Dynasty?

The establishment of the county gentry council was not that the imperial court gave the local gentry the right to govern the local gentry, because the imperial court could not give a power that never existed in itself. In addition to Shunyi County, do you know that there is still a county in the world, and the orders of the imperial court can be conveyed to the rural level? ”

Huang Liji, Guo Yunhou, Qian Qianyi and others looked at each other, not knowing how to answer Chongzhen's question. Because the reality is just as Chongzhen said, the decrees of the imperial court are not directly facing the people, but are conveyed to the gentry everywhere. Whether it was going to the countryside to collect grain or levying forced labor, it was these gentry who presided over it. Without the support of the gentry, with dozens of officials in various counties and districts, there would be no way to complete the task of urging the department to collect grain delivered by the imperial court every year.

Taking advantage of the hesitation and silence of Huang Liji and others, Zhu Youzhen continued: "Besides, I am an official of the Ming Dynasty today, who has studied hard for ten years, and once he was named on the gold list, he became a Baili Hou who governed tens of thousands of people, hundreds of thousands of people, and his parents and officials.

They may be good at reading, but no one can see how well they govern people's livelihood. There are many mediocre officials and very few ministers.

But according to the rules of my Ming officialdom, as long as the seniority is reached, you can be promoted step by step. It is because officials all over the world are reluctant to do things, and only want to mix peacefully until the end of their term of office, and then be promoted according to the order of seniority.

Yes, if you don't do something, you can't make mistakes, but if you do something, you may not get any good results. Therefore, officials have developed the bad habit of talking about righteousness and avoiding trivial matters.

Do gentlemen, do you know what the private sector has to say about such officials? ”

Seeing Chongzhen's words, all colleagues were silent, and there seemed to be a little embarrassment in the room. Shi Fenglai couldn't help but turn around and said: "The ministers don't know, and please ask Your Majesty to solve your doubts?" ”

Zhu Youzhen nodded at Shi Fenglai before he said: "On weekdays, I talk about my heart and mind, and I will report to the king when I die." Such officials, except for empty talk about righteousness, will not benefit the country, and will only be wasted.

There are tens of thousands of officials in the Ming Dynasty, and if there are one or two such officials, it will be nothing. But if all the officials above the court are like this, then there is a problem with the system of selecting officials in my Ming Dynasty.

Don't gentlemen, do you think that this system of electing and appointing officials should also be changed? ”

Huang Liji looked at the eyes of his colleagues around him, and then he arched his hand to the emperor and said: "Your Majesty, when the cabinet official system was reformed last year, didn't the system of selecting and appointing officials have already changed, and how does Your Majesty plan to carry out the reform this time?" ”

Zhu Youzhen thought for a while and said: "I don't want to make big moves anymore, I blindly stick to the ancestral system, and want to rely on a set of rules to govern the country and the people for thousands of years, which is undoubtedly a sword." However, the change of the imperial decree made the people of the world at a loss, which also damaged the credibility of the imperial court.

However, when I read a book a few days ago, I saw that Zhang Jiuling, a famous minister of the Tang Dynasty, once advocated to Tang Xuanzong: not Lizhou County, not Taiwan Province. The governance of the Song Dynasty generally followed such principles.

I think that this principle of appointment is still good. If a state or a county cannot be governed, how can it be in charge of the politics of a country? If, as a local county official, he cannot suppress the county gentry council, but is restrained by the county gentry council, how can such an official be qualified to govern the party?

I think that from today onwards, my Ming officials, who are not from Lizhou County, will not be allowed to enter the cabinet. The ministers who had previously been trained in the Hanlin Academy were sent to various states and counties one by one, and they were included in the list of key official assessments, and if they had achievements, they were given priority for promotion.

In the future, officials who have served in Beijing since they left the post will be delegated to local posts for a period of time every six years. We should not allow officials to blindly camp in the capital, while the central and local officials do not interact with each other for a long time. ”

Regarding Chongzhen's proposition, several cabinet ministers, including Huang Liji, were slightly dissatisfied. However, they are not ignorant of the emperor's ideas, and they began to implement the cabinet responsibility system and carry out official reforms last year. The emperor's emphasis on local officials had made them realize that, as in the past, it was almost impossible to expect to spend decades in the Hanlin Academy, and then enter the cabinet overnight and become a master.

It's just that officials, including Huang Liji, did not expect that the emperor's subsequent changes would come so quickly. There is a great tide of Qiantang, a wave of unevenness, and a feeling of rising wave after wave.

However, the emperor's current proposal is not without supporters, in fact, since the Jiajing period, some officials and scholars have called for the cabinet not to blindly use ministers, and the imperial court should use talents in an eclectic manner. In particular, it is necessary to attach importance to the pro-people officials in various localities, because these pro-people officials are officials who directly face the people, and only when they do a good job can the country truly be prosperous and the people safe.

After Wanli, there were more voices supporting this proposition. After all, in the current Ming Dynasty, Beijing officials and local officials are almost about to become two unrelated systems. It is difficult for those who are released to the state and county after entering the office, and after more than ten years in the county, they will be promoted to the top of their careers.

And the Jinshi who stayed in the capital, no matter what official position they held in the capital, once they were released, they started as government officials. In particular, the low-grade imperial history and the important official positions of the middle and clear officials may be the governors of the ruling provinces once they are released.

The emergence of such a situation in the official system is naturally unfavorable for the Ming Dynasty. After all, without any hope of rising local officials, many people have become mediocre and corrupt officials who have made a fortune and left.

Huang Liji, the head of the cabinet, has just felt some tastes, so he is naturally unwilling to change the status quo like this. As soon as he came to power, he changed the rules as soon as he came to power, didn't he block the way up the road of those hard-working ministers in the Hanlin Academy. It is foreseeable that those former colleagues know about this and are estimated to be able to scold him to death in private.

Second, seniority in the capital is a shortcut to promotion, which everyone knows very well. Therefore, most of the officials who were able to stay in the capital had some connection with everyone present.

If the rules are changed now, the qualifications of these people in the past will not be in vain. After they go to the place, even if they can get their private attention, but after all, the whip is beyond their reach, and if something happens, it will be difficult for them to help in time.

Besides, local officials are all thorny issues in governing local areas, from money and grain to developing people's livelihood and economy. Now there is also an additional county gentry meeting, which restrains the governance behavior of officials on weekdays.

It is true that the officials who can be killed from such an encirclement must be the people who are chosen to govern the country from above. But if you can't kill it, it will become a stepping stone for others to climb up.

This cabinet meeting lasted longer than Zhu Youzhen expected. Several cabinet ministers responded to each other and started a Tai Chi push with him, hoping to dispel or delay the change in the system of selecting and appointing officials.

However, the establishment of the county gentry council, which everyone originally wanted to deny at today's cabinet meeting, avoided the focus of everyone's discussion.

Zhu Youzhen and his ministers reached a consensus bit by bit in this constant exchange of words. Both sides are trying not to take the cabinet meeting to the extreme and create a rift between them.

The current Ming Dynasty, not only Zhu Youzhen needs the support of these ministers, but also the cabinet also needs the full trust of the emperor in order to have absolute control over the government.

A cabinet that is not trusted by the emperor will soon fall under the attack of the speakers. And the emperor, who had lost the support of the cabinet, could not suppress the civilian clique and implement the new policy. This is a situation in which cooperation is beneficial to both parties, and division is a situation in which two injuries are harmed.

In the end, Chongzhen reached a compromise with the cabinet, and the cabinet chose to partially accept the emperor's proposal. The establishment of the county gentry conference was changed to be held in batches, and the exchange between officials in the capital and local officials also began on a pilot basis.

The gentry conference finally came to a successful conclusion at the end of May, not only about the adoption of the development plan for the industrial city, but also about the low-key conclusion of Henan's affairs.

What deeply touched the representatives of these gentry was that they realized their own strength for the first time.

There seemed to be a door open to them, making them realize that in this world, not only the emperor and the imperial court can decide all national affairs, but when they are united, they also have the power to influence the direction of the country's policymaking.

In Xiyuan, Zhu Youzhen finally officially received several representatives of the Henan gentry who played a great role in the gentry conference.

He looked at the middle-aged man in the lead, and couldn't help but nod to him and asked, "You are the bull Venus who has contributed a lot this time?" ”

Niu Jinxing hurriedly knelt down and replied: "Back to Your Majesty, the minister is Niu Jinxing, and please give your Majesty a lecture." ”

Zhu Youzhen looked at him and thought for a while, before he said: "You did a very good job this time, I heard that you are still a lifter?" ”

"Yes, the minister is the one who lifted the seventh year of the Apocalypse."

"So what's next for you? Do you want to continue to return to your hometown to prepare for the Jinshi exam? Inaugurated as a representative of the county gentry? Or do you want to listen to my arrangement? ”

Hearing the several choices given by the emperor, Niu Jinxing hesitated for a long time. In fact, he still wants to go back to prepare for the exam and ask for a Jinshi background. After all, this is also the goal he struggled for when he was studying, and giving up now always makes him lack something in his heart.

As for returning to his hometown to serve as a representative of the county gentry, since he has already left Henan, he has no intention of returning to his hometown to be a local snake. Only the emperor's last condition made it difficult for him to make up his mind.

After thinking about it for a long time, he finally couldn't resist the temptation and said, "The minister is willing to let His Majesty arrange." ”