Chapter 53 Section 6. Officials are not allowed to go to the countryside

The bottom of the society has been firmly covered by an even and tight net, and Zhu Yuanzhang's eyes are on the class outside the control of this lijia net: officials. The traditional Chinese bureaucracy has a contradictory personality.On the one hand, they have strong inertia, lack of sense of responsibility and enterprise, they push at the top and move at the bottom, perfunctory, formalism, and bureaucracy prevail; Get rich, sharpen your head, rack your brains, do everything you can.Once the emperor's surveillance is slightly relaxed, they will create countless new tricks of corruption and breaking the law.

The duality of officials in the Ming Dynasty was the most prominent, because the status of officials was greatly reduced compared with the previous dynasties.Before the Tang and Song Dynasties, officials had always enjoyed great power and various preferential treatment.For example, in a company, the emperor is the chairman, and the officials are the shareholders and senior employees. The future and development of the company are related to everyone's interests, so the officials have a relatively high sense of responsibility.However, Zhu Yuanzhang took all the main powers into his own hands, and officials only had the function of executing orders and running errands, and became senior slaves of the royal family.These senior slaves do not have the power to think independently and create, they also lack enthusiasm for creation, and they are even more indifferent to the future and destiny of the company.At the same time, their excess energy is bound to be poured into the other side, and they will burst out with greater vitality in the activities of using power for personal gain.

In order to manage these senior servants well, Zhu Yuanzhang took great pains.He tied the hands and feet of officials with rules and regulations, so that they could only move within the scope of his strict regulations.He was afraid that the local officials would not be careful or dedicated, so he personally wrote the "Instructions for Appointment and Appointment", which made detailed regulations on the duties of local officials at each level.He divided local official duties into "publishing announcements", "requisitioning grain", "managing warehouses", "accounting", "accepting lawsuits", "managing prisoners", "managing government real estate", "managing scholars within the jurisdiction", Thirty-one items such as "management of local fisheries" and "management of local kilns and metallurgy", and item by item list the matters that local officials should pay attention to, and often list many specific requirements for these matters.

For example, for the item of "management of prisoners", it is not only necessary to know how many cases have been closed and how many prisoners are in custody, but also "know how long the imprisonment is, the severity of the matter, what facts are proven, and what circumstances are suspicious. Understand Those who are involved must be concluded; those who are suspected should be examined in detail, in order to ensure that the matter is reasonable and fair, so as not to cause injustice.”Earnestly instructed, like a mother-in-law with a broken mouth, I just wish I could teach them how to do it one by one, turning into tens of thousands, and closely monitoring them.For officials in the capital, he formulated the "Six Offices", which clearly defined the job responsibilities of all officials in each department, department, and section, and even calculated how much ink money was spent every month. Carry out refined management.

In response to officials' strong enthusiasm for corruption, Zhu Yuanzhang enacted the most stringent anti-corruption laws in history.He strictly forbids officials to go out in their spare time to be "chic", and stipulates that "officials whoring whores are inferior to murder, and even if they are pardoned, they will not be officials again for life."The pettyness and harshness of the restrictive regulations on officials was almost unbearable.For example, he stipulates that when officials are on business trips, they cannot use public vehicles to transport personal belongings: "For business trips, those who can take official horses, busses, and official camels according to their ranks, except for their personal clothes, their personal belongings must not exceed ten catties. Offenders will be given ten strokes of the cane if it exceeds five catties, and the penalty will be increased for each additional ten catties, up to sixty sticks. Those who take the boat can bring more, but it must not exceed thirty catties. Ten strokes, plus one level for every 20 catties, until 70 sticks. Family members and followers are not allowed to take the bus. If anyone is greedy for petty gains and asks officials to help him bring his personal belongings, this person is guilty of the same crime as the officials. confiscated."

Contrary to the current encouragement of officials to go deep into the grassroots to observe people's conditions, Zhu Yuanzhang made a strange rule: Officials were not allowed to go to the countryside.The experience of the peasants gave Zhu Yuanzhang an unbreakable impression: those officials who came to the countryside came to eat, drink, search and disturb the people.After he became emperor, he said: "When I was among the people, I personally experienced that officials in prefectures and counties were not sympathetic to the people. They were often greedy for money and lust, drinking and doing nothing. They were indifferent to the sufferings of the people and were genuinely angry." Therefore, he stipulated that officials I can only stay in the government office honestly, and I am not allowed to check the people's sentiments.If an official dared to go to the countryside, the common people could arrest him and send him to the capital, where he would personally execute him.

This regulation binds officials to the government, which is similar to that which binds the common people to the land. Under the binding of Zhu Yuanzhang's ropes, the initiative and freedom of officials were compressed to the lowest point in history.