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

Chapter 916 Mining Rights
The case in Jiangnan is still ongoing. Qian Qianyi, Zhang Xijun and others have arrested many people in one fell swoop after launching the case in Jiangnan. Coupled with the actions in the capital, this case has become the first Yongming case that shocked the world.

As the inside story of the case gradually spread, the views of the Donglin Party throughout the Ming Dynasty changed dramatically in an instant. No one could believe that the Donglin Party, which had always been known for its integrity and always claimed to be serving the country and the people, would actually do such a thing: collude with foreign enemies, sell out the country, engage in corruption, privately mine, and even embezzle the national treasury to steal and sell grain, and misappropriate local military treasuries to sell weapons and firearms to the Jian Nu. This was simply unimaginable.

Instantly, the reputation of the Donglin Party was ruined. Although many of the people who arrested people were officials of the Donglin Party, this still could not prevent everyone's view of the Donglin Party from changing dramatically. In addition, many officials of other parties fanned the flames in this case. Although they intended to intervene in the case directly and wanted to use this case to completely defeat the Donglin Party, they were stopped by Zhu Shenzhui, but they still made many small moves in private.

Since the court meeting that day, Zhu Shenzhui, including the cabinet and the three judicial departments, have continuously received reports exposing the crimes of the Donglin Party. Although most of the reports were groundless, many were true. These reports came in like snowflakes, and there seemed to be an attitude of completely eradicating the Donglin Party. This made the Donglin Party members headed by Sun Chengzong feel uneasy.

However, Zhu Shenzhu summoned them privately to appease them, and told them clearly that the Donglin Party was just a school of thought and not a real party. Since it was a school of thought, there were naturally good and bad people among them.

The crimes of some people do not mean that everyone has problems. This matter needs to be looked at separately. Moreover, as the emperor, Zhu Shenzhu did not think that all Donglin Party members were traitors, but rather that they were all villains. Otherwise, he would not have used Sun Chengzong, Qian Qianyi and other Donglin Party members to handle the case. This has already shown his attitude.

Of course, it is true that the Donglin Party has a bad reputation now, and the key lies in the Donglin Party itself. The Donglin Party has not reflected on itself in recent years, and has not made any discrimination among its members in order to expand its influence, which has led to a mixture of good and bad people, and a bad apple spoils the whole pot of soup.

Zhu Shenzhui told them not to worry too much about it, as the problem was theirs and the court would not implicate others. The Ming Dynasty never did things that implicated others, so he told them to do their jobs with peace of mind and prove their loyalty to the Ming Dynasty with practical actions. As long as they did this, he, the emperor, would naturally help them make the decision.

Zhu Shenzhui's clear attitude reassured Sun Chengzong and others, at least indicating that the emperor had no intention of expanding the case. Of course, Zhu Shenzhui also put forward his demands while expressing his position. The first point was that he hoped that the backbone of the Donglin Party could stabilize the south for the court, change the previous situation in the south, and enable the power of the center to completely control all parts of the south.

Secondly, the corresponding policies of the Ming Dynasty are now being implemented well in the north. After the south stabilizes, these policies should be gradually implemented from north to south, and the implementation of the policies also requires their assistance.

As for the third point, Zhu Shenzui said that the Donglin Party’s reputation is not very good now, and it would not be appropriate if they continued to use the Donglin Party’s banner. If possible, he hoped that Donglin could be abandoned and other names could be used, or that as an academic school, it did not need to be called a party. This would further eliminate the impact of this case, which would be beneficial to everyone.

Regarding these three requests, Sun Chengzong smiled bitterly in his heart. How could he not understand Zhu Shenzhu's real thoughts? But in the current situation, the Donglin Party has no power to resist. If they do not follow Zhu Shenzhu's requirements, the consequences will be extremely serious.

In desperation, Sun Chengzong and others could only express their acceptance of Zhu Shenzhu's request. The first two points were fine, but the key lay in the third point of abandoning Donglin and reorganizing. This step was difficult to take, but it had to be done. The situation was stronger than the people, and they were helpless about it.

While appeasing Sun Chengzong and others, Zhu Shenzui also took advantage of the forces of other parties to arrange for an attack on the Donglin Party, and used this opportunity to make major adjustments to many officials in the south, including the positions of the six ministers of Nanjing and the Zhejiang Provincial Administration Commissioner.

During the process of adjusting these official positions, Zhu Shenzhui appropriately exchanged interests with other factions, and thus smoothly recovered the mining and tax rights including those in Jiangnan. In addition, after being implicated in the private mining in Jiangnan, the court directly announced a comprehensive lifting of the ban on minerals in various parts of the Ming Dynasty. However, this time the ban was different from that during the Wanli period. The court would no longer send mining supervisors to local areas to be responsible for mining. Instead, the matter was handed over to the Ministry of Revenue, the Ministry of Works and the Imperial Household Department. The other three parties collected information and evaluated the minerals in various places, and then sold them in the form of mining rights contracts.

This move was unprecedented. Mineral resources have always been controlled by the state, even if the private mining found this time was actually illegal and violated the law of mining ban. Zhu Shenzhu directly contracted and sold the mining rights, which not only broke the previous mining ban practice, but also changed the mining rules since the founding of the Ming Dynasty.

This change is shocking enough, but the resistance to its implementation is not great after the Donglin Party case. On the one hand, as the Donglin Party's private mining activities were exposed, the people in the court knew that some things could not be concealed. You must know that it was the Donglin Party who had urged the ban on mining in the early days, but it was also these people who privately mined and profited from it while banning mining in the court.

They said one thing in front of others and another behind their backs. Their words and deeds were inconsistent. Their actions were self-contradictory. If they were to use the mining incident as an excuse, it would not make sense. Moreover, if the Donglin Party did these things, did other parties not do similar things? Of course not! These people were basically all evil. The Donglin Party had done a lot of things that they could do, but they were not investigated. If the emperor wanted to take this opportunity to conduct a thorough investigation, I am afraid no one would be able to escape.

Now the emperor has directly lifted the ban on mining and announced that the mining rights will be contracted and sold. If you agree to this request, there will be no harm but only benefits. If you agree to this request and directly take over the mining rights, then the previous private behavior will become a legitimate behavior. Although there will be some loss in income, it is much better than those who were imprisoned, right?

You have to know that everyone knows what the future will be for the Donglin Party members and local gentry, including businessmen, who were found to have secretly mined because of this case. Even if they don't die, they will be skinned alive and end up in such a miserable way. The amount of money they made before is as miserable as their current situation, and the wealth they have accumulated with great difficulty has become like the moon in the well and the flowers in the water.

Now, as long as you spend a little money, you can completely clean up your dirty and turn clean. Anyone with a little bit of brains can easily figure out whether this deal is worthwhile. Moreover, the huge benefits brought by the lifting of the complete mining ban have attracted countless people. Even if many officials have done similar things privately before, the scope of their work is limited to a part of it. Compared with the rich mineral resources of the entire Ming Dynasty, what do they have?

Countless people are extremely enthusiastic about this, including not only officials, but also many big businessmen from all over the country, local gentry groups, etc. These people know too well the huge benefits involved and are eager to grab a piece of the pie.

In order to finalize the matter, Zhu Shenzui first put up for sale a dozen mines that were implicated by the Donglin Party this time. Soon, with the joint efforts of the Ministry of Revenue, the Ministry of Works and the Imperial Household Department, these mines including Niutou Mountain were successfully sold. The ten-year mining rights for each mine brought in nearly one million taels of income per year. This was not counting the court's regulations that the mined resources must be sold to the government and that taxes must be paid accordingly. If all these were added up, the amount would be at least millions. These revenues immediately alleviated the financial shortage of the Ming Dynasty, making Yang Sichang and others very happy.

More importantly, these mines only account for a small part of the entire Ming Dynasty's mineral resources, not even one percent. If the entire Ming Dynasty's mineral resources were to be mined in this way, the annual income from the sale of mineral mining rights alone would be terrifying.

Of course, this is simply impossible. The amount of mineral resources is real, but the current productivity and technical capabilities of the Ming Dynasty are such that the minerals that can be mined and mined profitably are really limited. Moreover, the Ming Dynasty does not have that many people with mining technology, so according to estimates, it would be great if it could get several times or even ten times the first sale.

Even so, the relief effect on the Ming Dynasty's finances was extremely significant. You should know that during the Tianqi years, the Ming Dynasty relied on Wei Zhongxian's unscrupulous wealth collection, and the annual revenue of the Ming Dynasty was only tens of millions, and this figure of tens of millions of revenue only appeared in one year, and the remaining years generally maintained at more than seven to eight million.

But now, just from the sale of mining rights, the Ming Dynasty's income has exceeded the fiscal revenue during the Wei Zhongxian period. With such a large amount of income, the financial problems of the Ming Dynasty have been directly solved. This is not even counting the ordinary commercial taxes and other taxes. If all of them are included, the amount will be even more amazing.

Of course, it is impossible to increase so much tax revenue all at once. It takes time, but the improvement of the current situation is real, and it is beneficial to all parties. Those officials are not stupid, and the merchants and gentry are not stupid. They can see the benefits of this policy of the court. Of course, some people are still thinking about making small moves behind the court's back, but how can Zhu Shenzhu let them do what they want? The Donglin Party, which was suppressed and suffocated before, has now become a tool in Zhu Shenzhu's hands. Since other parties have benefited from it, they will never be willing. As long as Zhu Shenzhu spreads the news appropriately and gives them a chance, these angry Donglin Party members will definitely stare at them with red eyes. If anyone makes a small move, Zhu Shenzhu doesn't need to investigate, these Donglin Party members will jump out one by one to report, leaving them nowhere to hide.

(End of this chapter)