"Outside of Beijing, there are still many fields that are deserted. Except for the two cities of Beijing and Tianjin, as well as the two sides of the canal between the two cities, which have now regained some liveliness and people, many other places are still empty. How can the land of Beijing and Tianjin be deserted?
To be able to do this, we must immigrate to enrich Gyeonggi.”
At the Wuying Palace, Zhu Yihai directly proposed an immigration plan to restore the Gyeonggi region and even the depopulated status quo caused by the war between Yan, Jin, and Liao.
It is said that the peak population of the Ming Dynasty was at the end of Wanli. Some said the population reached more than 100 million, and some said it reached 200 million. However, the official Ming Dynasty records recorded a peak population of more than 70 million, but later generations generally believe that the actual population peaked at over 100 million. The population peak was basically at
Between the end of Wanli and the reign of Tianqi.
Basically, it is estimated that the population is between more than 100 million and close to 200 million. Even after the Qing Dynasty entered the Pass and occupied the country, the population at the bottom was still around 120 million.
At the same time, Europe could be called a big city if it had a population of 20,000 to 30,000 people. However, in the Ming Dynasty, a population of 20,000 to 30,000 people could only be considered an ordinary city. Moreover, in the late Ming Dynasty, the proportion of urban population was relatively high, and the urbanization rate could reach 8%.
, the urban population in the late Ming Dynasty was more than 15 million.
The main reason why the official population data is low is that under the tax service system of the Ming Dynasty, people were allowed to flee their households and directly surrender to the wealthy gentry. In addition, many people were not included in the court statistics. Various reasons caused the actual population to be lower than the official population.
Much lower than official.
Later, the Tatars started to increase the number of people working on the farm without increasing the tax, which caused a huge population explosion. In fact, it was not exactly a big explosion, but because after the people rented the land, it was equivalent to canceling the head tax, and the people no longer had to hide the number of people with household registration.
There was no need to send names to the gentry, a large number of private households were registered for naturalization, and without the pressure of the poll tax, the poor people also allowed themselves to have children.
Zhu Yihai was deeply touched by this aspect. After he raised troops in eastern Zhejiang, he immediately began to implement new policies such as increasing the number of sons into acres, and the integration of officials and gentry into paying grain. He canceled the original complicated and heavy various services and unified them into dingyin.
Yin hired people to work on their behalf, and Ding Yin spread the land into the fields, which was actually borne by the landowners, and industry and commerce also borne part of it, freeing the people from the heavy taxes and labor in the late Ming Dynasty.
In addition, the crackdown on registered registered households, the withdrawal of military households, and the reclassification of craftsmen's households have resulted in a large increase in the number of registered residents in various places.
"I propose that all officials in Beijing and all officers and men stationed in Beijing should move their families to settle in the capital. The imperial court will directly grant them land for resettlement according to the official grade and military rank.
In addition, all honorable ministers who have been awarded knights, officials of fifth rank or above, and those who serve abroad should also move their family members to Gyeonggi."
When the emperor said these words, the ministers who participated in the Wuying Hall court meeting did not react much, because this was something that was expected. The prince had previously visited the north on behalf of the emperor to investigate the emptiness of the capital.
We are also beginning to discuss countermeasures. Immigration is inevitable.
How to move it is not difficult to guess.
During the Northern Expedition of the Ming Dynasty, Emperor Taizu of the Ming Dynasty went all the way north, and after conquering most of the capital, he also conducted several immigrations to Shandong, Hebei and other places. Later, after Zhu Di succeeded in the Nanjing Rebellion, he moved the capital to Beijing, and also carried out several large-scale immigrations to Beijing.
Their immigrants included officials, powerful families, merchants, and even military and civilian refugees.
It is almost inevitable for Beijing officials, honorable ministers, generals, and soldiers stationed in Beijing to move their families to settle in the capital. Although many ministers may live in various places and may not be willing to move like this, the situation is here.
But everyone didn't expect that the emperor's immigration plan was more drastic than they expected.
All internal and external service officers of fifth rank or above, all knighted ministers, and soldiers stationed in the capital must be relocated.
The scope is somewhat large.
Of course, this kind of relocation is generally limited to the officials and soldiers themselves, and does not require the relocation of their entire families.
Zhu Yihai went on to say, "Before the first year of Shaotian, the families of ministers who had been given titles and titles by the Ming dynasty. Those who do not have official titles in the dynasty now have to move to Beijing to settle down."
Wen Anzhi sat there calmly. In fact, the emperor had discussed this matter with them and the prime ministers at the Prime Minister's Office of Qianqingmen for a long time. The emperor intended to imitate the mausoleum system of the Han Dynasty and move some of the local high-ranking families. Come to the capital.
For those local high-ranking surnames who are currently conferred titles and official positions by the court, the court only requires them to move to the capital and settle down. It does not force their clansmen to move to the capital. Those who are willing to come are left to their own devices, and some land will be allocated for homesteads. We offer preferential terms and don’t force yourself to come even if you don’t want to.
But for those families that had received titles before the Ming Dynasty, families whose daughters had entered the palace as empresses, concubines, and concubines, families whose children had served in fifth-level positions in the court, and families who had held the rank of military attache, as long as Those who are still there, and there are no nobles, no above fifth rank, no garrison in the capital in the Shaotian Dynasty, will be forcibly moved to the capital this time.
Basically, those descendants of former honorable ministers, hereditary military attachés, and high-ranking bureaucratic families who are still there at this time must be basically local prominent families, or at least middle-level or above landowners.
Regardless of whether these people surrendered or surrendered before, or declined a few years ago, or for other reasons, they are not currently serving in the court, or their positions are not high, they will still be local powerful people.
For example, those nobles in Nanjing before, including Duke Xu Wenjue of Wei, Duke Zhu Guobi of Baoguo, Marquis of Linhuai Li Hongji, Marquis of Lingbi Tang Guozuo and many other princes and counts, together with Qian Qianyi and others, surrendered to the Qing Dynasty.
Some of these people later went to Beijing, but basically they were not reused. Later, most of them returned to Nanjing. In the Battle of Nanjing, they were all tricked to death by Yan Wogong.
After the liberation of Nanjing, Zhu Yihai's treatment of these people was actually quite benevolent. Basically, he confiscated the fields that had been given to them by the imperial court, cleared and recovered the military and official fields that they had occupied, and ordered the return of the land that they had accepted. , and then took back the houses given to them, while leaving the rest open to these families to keep.
Although they were forced to donate several times when defending the city of Nanjing, and each family donated several more times after the city was defeated, their vitality was still there.
This centipede is dead but not stiff.
Some members of the Xunchen family have joined the Shaotian Dynasty, and some have even emerged. However, most of the descendants of the old Xunchen, although politically dissatisfied, can continue to engage in business and trade. Taking advantage of the good momentum in the past few years, most of them are like ducks in water.
As for the families of honorable ministers who died at the hands of the Shun or Qing armies in Beijing, although most of them later had their titles taken back and their properties cleared, they retained more vitality and most of them have slowly recovered in recent years.
They began to enter the court again.
For example, the crown prince Taibao Ding Guogong Xu Yunzhen, who was killed after surrendering to the Chuang army, offered Qi Huamen surrender, and even petitioned to persuade him to join the army. However, in the end, he was executed by Li Zicheng. Zhu Chunchen, the Duke of Chengguo, was killed by the British when the city of Beijing fell.
Duke Zhang Shize, Marquis of Wuding Xu Xideng, etc.
There are also Chen Yanzuo, the Marquis of Taining, Chen Guangyu, the Marquis of Ningyang, Chang Yanling, the Marquis of Huaiyuan, Li Cunshan, the Marquis of Wuqing, Daoyun the Prince of Chengshan, Liu Si'en the Prince of Guangning, Zhu Zihong the Prince of Wujin, Yongen the Prince of Jingyuan, etc. who were deprived of titles after the fall of the Ming Dynasty.
Many of them neither died for their country nor were killed, and most of them fled into hiding after the two capitals fled.
For these people, Zhu Yihai originally only wanted to seize titles and clear the land, but ignored the rest. He even gave officials the chance to use their talents.
For old ministers such as Pingjiang Bo Chen Zhi'an, Xinle Marquis Liu Wenbing, Hui'an Bo Zhang Qingzhen, and Zhangwu Bo Yang Chongyou who would rather die than surrender and committed suicide to uphold their country's integrity, Zhu Yihai did not reserve titles for their families, but only cleared them of their illegal occupation.
The rest of the occupied fields were recognized, registered and retained, and even posthumous titles were given to his wife and children.
The old ministers were also treated according to different grades. Those who surrendered to the captives in Kaicheng were the last ones, then those who surrendered, then those who invaded the army, bandits, and were killed by the Tartars, and then those who escaped and lived in seclusion committed suicide to keep their integrity and fight.
Those who die for their country are superior.
Different treatments will be given to different performances.
Those who sacrificed their lives for their country not only had their property preserved, but also had their children favored and appointed officials. For those who surrendered to the city and surrendered, their fields and houses were basically recovered, and even fined or confiscated, or a lot of money was donated.
Basically being kept away from Shaotian Chaotang.
Now Zhu Yihai thought of these people again.
No matter what kind of old heroes they are, they will all be moved to Gyeonggi now. Although these people no longer have Spyker and political power, they still control a lot of local resources, are still local powerful, and will have strong influence in the local area.
The right to speak.
For the imperial court, these people cannot threaten the imperial court now, but they will not be the basic force loyal to the country at the local level.
Now when it comes to relocating people to enrich Gyeonggi, these people are the first choice.
At that time, the Western Han Dynasty used the strategy of moving powerful people to guard the tombs to deal with the descendants of the nobles of the Six Kingdoms, and even the wealthy and powerful families who had reached a certain level of property and influence in the local area. They moved these people from various places to Guanzhong, so that the nobles of the Six Kingdoms moved and left.
The homeland also lost its strong influence. Without these forces in the local area, it would be much easier for the Western Han Dynasty court to establish effective local rule.
Secondly, after a large number of nobles and powerful people moved to Guanzhong, Guanzhong became a special economic zone. These powerful and wealthy households gathered in Guanzhong for business and consumption, which greatly promoted the economic development of Guanzhong.
The imperial court moved these people under the nose of the imperial court so that they could be monitored better.
Later, whenever an influential family emerged in the local area, the imperial court used the excuse of guarding the mausoleum to move them to Guanzhong to try to weaken the emergence of powerful families.
For Zhu Yihai, the old heroes are now submissive and respectful to Shao Tianchao and Emperor Shao Tian, but this is not enough.
The world's resources are limited and can only be controlled by a few people. Of course, it is better to be controlled by one's closest direct descendants.
He revitalized the Ming Dynasty's Eastern Zhejiang heroes, Yuying Yuancong, the two civil and military forces, especially the martial arts groups such as Yuying. Zhu Yihai needed to support them so that they could share weal and woe with the emperor and the country and become a solid alliance of interests.
As for the old Xunchen family, they are not part of the emperor's core alliance, so they cannot be allowed to have too much resources and influence.
Forcibly moving these old heroes to Beijing will not only help restore the population and economy of Gyeonggi, but also weaken their strength. Especially after moving them here, they will use the barren fields here to exchange their scarce and valuable fields in other places, which will make them even more vulnerable.
Break away from the place where your family has lived for generations and uproot them so that they can no longer have a strong influence in the local area.
This is accomplished in one fell swoop.
These old heroes, those who surrendered to the invaders, were moved directly to the north of the Great Wall, allowing them to reclaim the wasteland on their own, while those who were killed were resettled in the outskirts of the capital.
Escape and hide in places such as Yongping and Xuanhua.
Those who died in battle or committed suicide were placed in Shuntian Prefecture and Tianjin Prefecture.
Not only are the resettlement sites different, but the treatment given is also different. Those who surrendered have to relocate and cultivate at their own expense, and the court will not provide any subsidies.
For those families who committed suicide in battle, the court would also provide them with some resettlement allowances, etc., and even retain some of their original farmland, or replace it with more mature land.