Gou was a member of the imperial family in the late Ming Dynasty

Chapter 209 Old Dog
The Emperor Tianqi was furious, and Wei Zhongxian was so scared that he immediately knelt down and kowtowed.

"Your Majesty, I just want to help you solve your problems. I have no other selfish motives. I was inconsiderate and didn't think about these things. I am guilty... I know my guilt..." Wei Zhongxian swore that he had no selfish thoughts and just wanted to do things for the emperor.

"Hmph!" Tianqi snorted unhappily and cursed Wei Zhongxian unceremoniously, then let him get up.

After he stood up, Tianqi, whose expression had eased, gave Wei Zhongxian a few more warnings.

The abolition of mining and tax supervisors was clearly written in the Wanli Emperor's will, and Emperor Taichang also issued a clear decree when he was in power. If this matter is brought up again, it will cause a stir in the court and will lead to attacks.

After hearing this, Wei Zhongxian understood. He blamed himself for being negligent. Why didn't he think of this? It was fine if it was Emperor Wanli. Besides, outsiders didn't know what was going on in Wanli's will. How could he not know? With Emperor Wanli's always stingy and money-hungry personality, how could he abolish the mining and tax supervisors in his will?

But Emperor Taichang was different. He was the biological father of the current emperor. After he succeeded to the throne, Taichang did say that the mining and taxation supervisors were evil policies. If Emperor Tianqi re-employed the mining and taxation supervisors, it would be equivalent to abolishing Emperor Taichang's will. How could a son be so unfilial? Emperor Tianqi would never do this, let alone let this handle fall into the hands of the civil service group.

Wei Zhongxian, who had figured it out, wanted to slap himself in the face. He was only thinking about how to help his master get money, but he didn't consider this point. The Donglin Party was powerful in the court, and the civil service group had always suppressed the imperial power. The issue of mining supervision and tax supervision was very sensitive, and the interests involved all aspects. Once this was done, those vested interests would definitely jump out to oppose it. Wouldn't this cause trouble for the emperor? Who else could the Emperor Tianqi scold if not him?

But where else could he get the money if not from this aspect? Wei Zhongxian was a little embarrassed for a while. The taxation policy of the Ming Dynasty had always been problematic. When the Ming Dynasty was founded, Zhu Yuanzhang established a taxation system, which mainly included three points.

The first is land tax, the second is population tax, and the third is business tax.

Among them, land tax was the main source of tax revenue for the Ming Dynasty. At the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, due to the war at the end of the Yuan Dynasty, the population dropped sharply and the land was abandoned.

In order to encourage land reclamation and restoration of production, the imperial court introduced a number of policies. At that time, these policies played a considerable role and had good results. However, as the Ming Dynasty was established for a long time, with the increase of population and social development, land annexation was inevitable.

The same is true for the population tax. During the Taiping years, the population continued to increase, and the population increased several times compared to the initial period. However, in the middle and late Ming Dynasty, the collection of these two taxes encountered many problems. Whether it was land tax or population tax, as time went on, most of them were pressed on the common people. The gentry class either relied on privileges to avoid paying taxes or concealed the population and land, which resulted in more and more land being reclaimed, and the population being the same, but the tax was actually decreasing.

As for commercial taxes, it is not to mention that when the Ming Dynasty was founded, the commercial tax was 15%, but later it became 20%, and now the commercial tax has been relaxed to 30%. Throughout the dynasties, the commercial tax of the Ming Dynasty can be said to be the lowest, but even with such a low commercial tax, it is often difficult to collect.

There are many problems that make it difficult to collect taxes, the main one being the interests of the privileged class, that is, the civil service group, the noble group, and the local gentry group. They use their privileges to collude with each other and evade taxes or even do not pay taxes through various means such as tax exemption, smuggling, tax evasion, and bribery.

Let's not talk about other commercial taxes, let's just talk about the customs. There are two main customs in the Ming Dynasty, one is Fujian Customs and the other is Guangdong Customs. Judging from the current commercial scale of the southern part of the Ming Dynasty, these two customs can collect a lot of commercial taxes in a year, but in fact, the commercial taxes collected by the two customs in a year are pitifully low. Among them, the Fujian Customs collected 23,400 taels of silver customs duties (commercial taxes), and the Guangdong Customs collected even less, only 22,000 taels. Even with this amount, the actual amount paid in a year is still less than the full amount.

Judging from this situation, the loopholes in the Ming Dynasty's commercial taxes can be imagined, which was also the main reason why Zhang Juzheng forcibly implemented reforms and new policies.

The imperial court could not collect taxes and could not do many things. People also concealed their land and households and evaded taxes seriously. In order to solve this problem, Zhang Juzheng implemented reforms, which changed the situation and allowed the imperial court to collect taxes. With money, the imperial court felt more confident and the country's strength continued to grow.

Zhang Juzheng's reforms brought great benefits to the country, but at the same time they also directly touched the interests of the privileged class. The reason is very simple. Zhang Juzheng's reforms made the privileges originally enjoyed by these interest groups disappear all of a sudden. In addition, taking money directly from their pockets further damaged their interests. When Zhang Juzheng was in power, they could only pay taxes with their noses pinched because they were afraid of Zhang Juzheng's power. In their hearts, they scolded Zhang Juzheng and wished they could eat his flesh. When Zhang Juzheng died, the mountain on these people's heads was gone in an instant, and all the counterattacks against Zhang Juzheng emerged in an instant. In addition, Emperor Wanli was young at the time, and he was fooled by the civil service group, which eventually led to the failure of the reform, and Zhang Juzheng's efforts were wasted. Emperor Tianqi was a very smart person. Think about it, are there really any stupid people among the descendants of the old Zhu family? Tianqi's great-grandfather, Emperor Jiajing, treated his ministers as chess pieces and played with them in his hands for decades. His great-great-grandfather, Emperor Longqing, was even more remarkable. Although Longqing's reign was short, he did a lot during his reign. He took advantage of the conflicts among the civil service groups and quietly changed many problems left by Jiajing. The most famous of these was the Longqing Opening, which was also the beginning of Zhang Juzheng's later New Deal.

As for his grandfather Wanli, there is no need to mention him. Although Wanli is not highly praised in history books, and the fundamental responsibility for the ultimate failure of Zhang Juzheng's reform lies with Wanli, to be fair, Wanli originally wanted to make a difference, but because he believed the lies of the civil service group and made irreparable mistakes, he took a wrong step that led to the failure of the reform, and he himself was caught in the vortex of decades of struggle with the civil service group.

Although Wanli no longer attended court, he still had a certain degree of control over the government. After the drawbacks of Zhang Juzheng's failed reform became apparent, Wanli tried several times and found that he could not compete with the coalition of the civil service group. However, he used a series of small actions and tricks to achieve his goals, such as sending mining supervisors and tax supervisors for this reason.

Emperor Tianqi also understood these situations. To be honest, he envied his grandfather Wanli because in the early days of Wanli's reign, he had a capable minister like Zhang Juzheng around him. Unfortunately, Emperor Tianqi did not have Zhang Juzheng. There is only one Zhang Juzheng in the world. It is difficult to meet such an outstanding figure who appears once in a thousand years.

Unlike the Wanli Emperor, the Tianqi Emperor ascended the throne hastily, and there was no minister he could truly trust in the court, and he only had Wei Zhongxian by his side. Facing internal and external troubles, the Tianqi Emperor could not compete with the civil service group with his own strength, especially the powerful Donglin Party. The only thing he could do was to rely on his status as an emperor and the loyal old dog by his side.

Wei Zhongxian had many faults and problems, but even so, his loyalty to himself was enough. Moreover, Tianqi was also able to use this old dog. In the past year, Wei Zhongxian had done a lot for Emperor Tianqi. In particular, Wei Zhongxian's rise and publicity made the Donglin Party shift their attention from the emperor to this old dog, which greatly reduced his own pressure, which also made Emperor Tianqi very satisfied.

At present, there are rumors of the "Eunuch Party" in the court. With Wei Zhongxian's efforts, he has won over a group of officials, and many officials from other factions who were originally suppressed by the Donglin Party have also joined him. The so-called Eunuch Party has become somewhat powerful. The Donglin Party has been constantly publicizing the evil deeds of the Eunuch Party in an attempt to force the Emperor Tianqi to kill Wei Zhongxian, so as to keep the noble man close to him and keep the villain away.

But how could the Tianqi Emperor do this? Wei Zhongxian was a vicious dog that he had released to bite people, and the target he wanted to bite was the Donglin Party. The more the Donglin Party hated the eunuch party and jumped up and down in hopes of killing Wei Zhongxian, the more proud the Tianqi Emperor felt.

Using Wei Zhongxian, the old dog, to deal with the Donglin Party was the most proud move of the Emperor Tianqi, and the current situation was developing just as he had expected. At present, Wei Zhongxian had not done enough, and the power of the Donglin Party had not been completely suppressed. The Emperor Tianqi would not do anything to Wei Zhongxian, but would continue to support him secretly until the Donglin Party collapsed.

Besides, the so-called eunuch party was just a name given by the Donglin Party. Wei Zhongxian worked for Emperor Tianqi and was a dog around him. So the eunuch party was actually the emperor party. The more powerful Wei Zhongxian was, the more officials he bribed, which meant that Emperor Tianqi gradually expanded his control over government affairs, and thus he went from being an emperor suppressed by the Donglin Party to an emperor who truly held the imperial power.

As for Wei Zhongxian's future, Emperor Tianqi was not worried at all.

The Ming Dynasty was different from other dynasties. As slaves of the royal family, eunuchs could never truly influence imperial power.

During the Ming Dynasty, Wang Zhen and Liu Jin were both powerful eunuchs. But their power came from the emperor. Without the emperor's support, neither Wang Zhen nor Liu Jin could have made any waves.

Let’s not talk about Wang Zhen for now, let’s just talk about Liu Jin, the man who was known as the “emperor”. Emperor Zhengde was able to knock Liu Jin, who was always high up in the clouds, down to the ground with just a piece of paper. Overnight, Liu Jin lost everything and was eventually cut into pieces and died.

The same is true for Wei Zhongxian. No matter how much this old dog barks, it is still his dog after all. Isn't there an old saying that goes, "When the cunning rabbit dies, the running dog is cooked." Before the Donglin Party was dealt with, Wei Zhongxian, this old dog, was still very useful. How could the Emperor Tianqi be willing to kill him? Not only could he not kill him, but he had to protect him well. If there really came a day when he needed to hide the bow and cook the dog, the Emperor Tianqi would naturally not be merciful.

(End of this chapter)