Bian Shengrong feels that this is a good time to overthrow the third prince, and take advantage of your illness to kill you!
The emperor has made it clear that he will not take this matter lightly. Murdering the prince is a serious crime. Why not make the third prince guilty of more crimes and be more violent?
If the third prince can be eliminated this time, the eldest prince will have one less opponent in the future.
"What Mr. Bian said is true. Two hundred and eighty thousand taels of silver is not a small amount. The salt tax is the largest tax in this dynasty, and no one is allowed to get involved. What's more, the national treasury is still not full. How should so much tax be spent every year?
Where are you, why do the border officers and soldiers lack food, clothing, and pay every year?"
Deng Chenghong, the censor of Zuodu, came out. He felt that anyone who was involved in tax collection was a worm in the court, and he especially hated such officials.
Every year, taxes are collected from the bottom and exploited layer by layer. The people are miserable and the national treasury is still not rich. It is time to rectify the government and the opposition.
The third prince just accepted filial piety every year, and could freely give out 280,000 taels of silver.
It is conceivable how much benefit those officials below received?
Every time when the national treasury is mentioned as insufficient, the government and the opposition parties can only propose spending cuts.
Later, after Gu Chengyu of the Hanlin Academy proposed tea tax and salt tax, the situation became better.
But no official has ever dug deeper into the root cause of the insufficient treasury. Everyone has kept it secret. Isn't it because there has never been a crown prince?
Everyone is afraid of offending a certain prince. When that prince is established as the prince in the future, wouldn't it mean that he will be left with nothing to eat?
Now that the prince has been established, and the prince is kind-hearted and always considers the people, it is time to bring up these topics that he usually dare not mention.
Gu Chengyu stood in the back with his head down and sneered. These people were too anxious.
The emperor looked very angry now and handed the matter over to Dali Temple for investigation. Naturally, he also wanted to punish the third prince severely.
It is not impossible for the third prince to be imprisoned in the clan mansion in the end, or even expelled from the royal clan and demoted to common people.
But this is the appearance that can be seen now. The emperor is furious at this time, and of course he will not give the third prince good things to eat.
But after the anger in the emperor's heart calmed down a little, could the emperor tolerate it when he saw these officials eager to add insult to injury?
If these officials were followed and the third prince was severely punished or killed, there is no guarantee that the emperor would not regret it in the future.
Then the blame will be placed on the officials who made matters worse at that time, and no one will be able to take advantage of it.
No matter how bad the third prince is, he is still a prince, the emperor's flesh and blood.
They are just ministers, but they want to trample the prince in the mud. This is contempt for the imperial power, and the emperor will inevitably be unhappy.
If the original plot of poisoning and murdering the prince was confirmed, the emperor would not be lenient in order to give an explanation to the prince and to the world.
But at this time, it would be superfluous to add other charges to the third prince, which would bring shame to the royal family.
It will also make the emperor more suspicious, thinking that the prince wants to get rid of the princes as soon as possible, and now he takes the opportunity to add insult to injury.
"Then what Bian Aiqing and Deng Aiqing mean is that this is all because the third prince accepted benefits, which caused our Dayan Dynasty to be short of money everywhere?"
The emperor squinted his eyes slightly, his expression a little darker than before.
Although the third child had attacked his eldest brother and deserved to be punished for his crime, he was his son after all. Did these people mean to force him?
Force him to expel the third child from the clan, or even kill him to avoid future troubles?
"Your Majesty, please calm down. This is not what Wei Chen meant. What Wei Chen just said does not refer to the third prince alone, but to most of the worms in the court. Whether the third prince accepted bribes, Wei Chen did not personally investigate, so it is difficult to draw a conclusion.
, Let’s ignore these for now. But I think there are quite a lot of corruption among officials in this court, and I would like to ask the emperor to investigate thoroughly!”
Although Deng Chenghong was an official in the lineage of the second prince, he sincerely thought about the court and the people.
Although the taxes on the common people are not heavy, that is because the imperial court can still balance its expenditures due to the tea tax.
When the state treasury cannot make ends meet, the court will naturally increase taxes.
"Your Majesty! The minister, like Lord Deng, is definitely not targeting the third prince. It is just because of the rampant rumors some time ago. If the third prince did not do this, then please ask the emperor to clear the third prince's name."
Bian Shengrong felt unwilling when he saw that the emperor was actually somewhat protective of the third prince in his words.
The third prince did such a wrong thing, and the emperor still wanted to show favoritism.
His Royal Highness the Crown Prince suffered a lot of physical damage due to the poisoning, and he was almost defeated by the third prince.
Fortunately, His Highness the Crown Prince is very lucky and his strategies are not inferior to those of the other princes, otherwise he would have been dead at this moment.
It is really sad that a good legitimate son of the middle palace was forced into this position by other princes.
Now the emperor still wants to protect the culprit, which makes them feel uncomfortable!
"In the previous case of Hejian Mansion, the emperor had uprooted many officials and ordered Dali Temple to thoroughly investigate the matter. Now that the government and the public are clear, how can there be talk of corruption and bribery? What you two adults mean is that there is no such thing in this court.
Is he an upright official?"
Dai Yuanji, the Minister of War, couldn't stand the way these two men insisted on letting go. Of course, he definitely didn't want the emperor to let the third prince go.
But because these two people were princelings, he didn't like them.
"Okay! Now is not the time to talk about this. The case of the prince's poisoning must be solved as soon as possible to appease the officials and the people."
The emperor interrupted the confrontation between several people. He knew what these people meant. They just wanted to add more charges to the third child.
The wall fell and everyone pushed back. In the past, when officials made mistakes and were expelled from their posts, or even had their families confiscated and their families exterminated, these officials also suffered in this way.
I wish I could step on them a few more times so that those officials would never stand up again.
The emperor was used to the behavior of these officials, but now that the person being stepped on became his son, this finally made him feel unhappy.
Besides, if the third child is really unbearable, it will disgrace the royal family, and even the common people will spread the word, and the prince's upbringing is nothing more than this.
The third prince looked at the long red wall in front of him. This road he had to walk every day had never felt as long as it did now.
His legs were a little weak. If the guards on the side hadn't grabbed his arms, he didn't know if his limp body could have walked into the Hall of Supreme Harmony.
Taking a deep breath, what should come will come. He shook his legs and stepped up the steps.
Two guards on the side grabbed the third prince's arms, a trace of contempt flashed in their eyes.
He has the guts to murder the prince, but he doesn't have the guts to bear the consequences.
"My sons, please see your father, long live my emperor!"
As soon as he entered the Hall of Supreme Harmony and took a few steps forward, the third prince's knees weakened and he knelt on the ground.
"Lao San, you poisoned and murdered the prince. The evidence is conclusive. What else do you have to say?"
When the emperor saw the appearance of the third prince, his heart suddenly softened.
He originally wanted to reprimand him harshly, but his haggard and lifeless appearance made the emperor swallow the reprimand he was about to say.