No one wants to be the leader, let alone someone like Wang Anshi.
Even if Wang Anshi didn't know that Zhao Xi was using him as a spearhead, he still had to take the initiative.
From the tone of the official's conversation with him, he knew that the official did not oppose his market change law, but was concerned about the stability of the court and the reaction of the courtiers.
Times have changed, and now, because the imperial court has exempted Gongfang City from taxes and the contract has been signed, it has taken effect, causing the imperial court to experience financial stress for the next two months.
Even the subsidies for the Chinese New Year are slightly less than in previous years.
Wang Anshi felt that this was the best time. While his ministers and workers had not forgotten their complaints about paying money during the New Year, he proposed the Market Change Law, which would surely be followed by many!
Therefore, during the last great court meeting in the fifth year of Zhenghe, Wang Anshi dropped the bomb in Qinzheng Hall.
Because of the caisson, the noise in the main hall is really as powerful as a bomb!
My Lao Wang, are you sincere in not letting everyone have a good New Year?
Wang Anshi is pure, just as pure as Sima Guang, but their directions of purity are different.
Sima Guang was pure because he was old-fashioned, and believed that all deviations from ancient precepts and ancestral systems were wrong. Officials and ministers should learn from the ancients. Although he did not want the officials to rule by archeology, he did not want the officials to make troubles and ministers.
There should be no fuss.
In Sima Guang's opinion, state affairs should be recuperated.
Whether the officials are solving redundant troops or innovating industries to improve the court's financial situation, this is all a momentary success. To govern the country, you still have to rely on the royal way, recuperate, support the people, and consolidate the foundation of the subjects...that is, virtue.
and conduct.
Therefore, he sees no innovation or change. If any change occurs, he will regard it as a deviation from the holy rule and will refute it.
But five years after the official took office, he trained new troops, planned great policies, promoted young people, suppressed clan members, and now builds palaces... everything is a toss-up. In Sima Guang's view, everything is a waste of time and money.
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He also saw that His Majesty now has a troubled temper.
Wang Jiefu responded in the political hall, and he was completely unable to stop it. Therefore, he simply wanted to be out of sight and out of mind, so he resigned from the officials several times.
Wang Anshi simply wanted to assist the king in reviving the Song Dynasty.
Over the years, he has been transferred to local governments and courts. He has seen many of the shortcomings of the country and has come up with a targeted solution... which is to scrape bones and cure poison.
In Wang Anshi's view, the imperial court had reached a point where it had to be ruthlessly managed, and it was urgent and urgent.
All aspects of military, political, and financial affairs need to be changed, or drastically changed, or even overthrown and started over. If the court is unwilling to overthrow, it will inevitably be overthrown by other forces.
Therefore, working hard to govern was Wang Anshi's expectation in the court.
What he really lacks is the complicity with the court officials, or in other words, he does not have a deep understanding of the shamelessness of the court officials.
The dynasty did not suppress business, which also resulted in the dynasty's goods transactions being monopolized by big merchants, causing the merchants to exploit the people, and even affecting the national economy and people's livelihood.
The market change law is imperative. Of course, Wang Anshi is not a fool, and he also knows how to choose the right time. For example, now, at the end of the year, he proposed...
The reality of the imperial court's deficit, the fact that subsidies for the New Year were reduced, and the early construction of the Qinzheng Palace caused turmoil among the courtiers, the Zhengshitang, and the officials, which provided him with an excellent opportunity to propose the Market Change Law.
It's not like Wang Anshi didn't think about working with the officials in private to get this thing done. This was impossible. From the launch of the Qingmiao Law, Wang Anshi knew it was impossible.
Officials want to innovate, but they also want to stabilize the court. This is inherently contradictory.
In Wang Anshi's view, the official family is still the Zhao family, and they are always indecisive.
Forget it, since the officials couldn't make up their minds, they just opened the matter up themselves.
Zhao Xi was really helpless.
Let’s not talk about whether the market exchange method is suitable or not. The timing is really not good at this time.
It has been half a year since Wang Anshi proposed the Market Change Law. Zhao Xi has been busy in the past six months, also laying out the plans for the Market Change Law.
Zhao Xi really hates quarreling. This is not the normal state of being in power.
The reason why the Qinzheng Hall was built was ostensibly to find a living for the disaster victims. What Zhao Xi really wanted to do was to use the building to fix the pattern of court meetings, court meetings, and assembly meetings, and then let the courtiers sit in their seats to form a three-level decision-making system.
For example, the court meeting was not suitable for discussing affairs in court because there were too many participants. Therefore, the function of the court meeting was to issue decrees and implement them by ministers.
Even if ministers and ministers have objections, they can only use the method of reporting to avoid quarrels in the court meeting.
As for the court meeting, in Zhao Xi's vision, thirty or fifty people were selected from each party by the country's feudal officials, the six ministries and nine ministers, the political affairs hall, the Privy Council, and the military to form the decision-making body of the country.
This is the real deliberative body and the place where the policies and decrees of the country are formed.
You can argue here, but once a decision is made, everyone must implement it.
As for the assembly, in Zhao Xi's vision, it is the cabinet, which is the real leadership of the entire country.
This is the level at which various innovations are proposed, various policies are proposed, and discussed at the parliamentary level.
In Zhao Xi's vision, the courtiers who enter the assembly level are collectively called the cabinet, and they are all prime ministers. He drew on the cabinet system of the later Ming Dynasty, and even more on the system of the era in which he originally lived.
The second layer of court council was designated as court council, and all members were in power. This almost copied the system of later generations.
As for the third floor...well, it's still the morning meeting.
This is the institutional layout. Zhao Xi also made other preparations for the market change law.
The core of Wang Anshi's Yifa is a bit like the advancement of the country and the retreat of the people, or letting the court lead the transaction of goods.
In current parlance, it is called competing with the people for profit, and in later generations, it is called intervening in the market.
Regarding macro-control, Zhao Xi certainly knows that it is necessary. But it does not mean that, like Wang Anshi's Yi Fa, he wants court officials to directly replace Yahang and big merchants.
This is a big proposition about pricing power, regulatory responsibilities and market behavior. We must not let officials who should be managers directly disrupt the market like Wang Anshi did in changing the market law.
The reason why Zhao Xi built the palace and introduced many new things to Gongfang City during the construction of Qinzheng Hall was because he wanted to promote government-run industries.
The core purpose is not to divide the cake, but to make the cake. This will reduce the resistance of the benefited classes.
This involves approval power, pricing power, macro-control, court intervention, government-run industries, separation of management and management, and many other aspects.
The original intention of Zhao Xi to build the palace and dig pits full of ministers and bury them was to make the ministers aware of the importance of approval authority.
Starting from the fact that he and Gongfangcheng built a palace without the consent of the political hall, he guided the court to formulate an approval system, thereby changing the current situation of monopoly and price manipulation mentioned in Wang Anshi's Yifa.
Zhao Xi's plan was to start from the layout of the Qinzheng Hall, first adjust the dynasty's deliberation model, and then, under suitable conditions, Wang Anshi would propose the Market Change Law.
Then, in response to the background reasons proposed by the Market Change Law, the imperial court issued relevant macro-control laws.
Finally, government-run industries were launched to solve the financial situation of the court and alleviate the current situation of redundant officials in the country.
As a result, all his plans were completely disrupted by Wang Anshi's cold blow.