The Ming Dynasty did not revolutionize

Chapter 216 Principles for the Adjustment of Central Government Agencies
Zhu Jianxuan raised his head on principle and glanced at the reactions of the officials around him:
"Have you ever thought about this issue? Do you have any ideas or suggestions?"

Secretary Shen Chu was the first to speak:

“Your Highness, I think the simplest solution to the institutional merger is to directly change the Qinglisi of the Wu Kingdom into a ministry of the Ming Dynasty.

“Because the original government offices of the Wu Kingdom had complete functions, they were able to directly take over all the functions of the Ming Dynasty’s central court and directly connect with and manage local affairs.

“In order to facilitate the adaptation of local institutions, we can go through the procedure of splitting up and renaming the original Ming Dynasty court institutions and issue them as an imperial decree.

"The locals thought that the imperial court simply changed the original departmental composition and names into the existing forms of the Wu Kingdom."

Duan Yucai had not yet left for Europe, so he also joined the discussion:
"The number of departments that need to be 'renamed' and 'split up' is too large, and issuing such a large number of decrees would be very abrupt.

“So I think it is better to match the Wu State Qingli Division with the imperial court departments and transfer personnel with the same responsibilities to the corresponding departments of the imperial court.

“For example, tax officials were transferred directly to the Ministry of Taxation, those in the Trial Department were transferred directly to the Dali Temple, and those in the Water Conservancy Department, the Industry and Commerce Department, and the Construction Department were transferred to the Ministry of Works.

“For departments that Wu has but the imperial court does not, we will follow the process of establishing new departments.

“In fact, this is what we are doing now. The various Qinglisi have taken over the corresponding departments of the court according to their functions, but the actual official positions and ranks have not been adjusted yet.

"This is equivalent to the local officials of Wu being promoted to the central court of Ming Dynasty, and the impact on other places in Ming Dynasty will be minimal."

Yao Nai interrupted when he heard this:

"Such transfers and appointments will certainly have little impact on local areas.

“However, if the personnel of the Water Conservancy Department, Industry and Commerce Department, and Construction Department were transferred to the Ministry of Works, it would actually be a direct merger of the three Qingli Departments.

"How will the positions and ranks of the personnel in these three departments be arranged in the future?"

When Yao Nai said this, many officials couldn't help but look up and peek sideways at Zhu Jianxuan who was sitting above, wanting to know what His Royal Highness the Crown Prince meant.

In fact, this is the issue that everyone is concerned about.

The official positions and ranks of the civil servants in the Wu State were very low, with the highest-level doctors and secretaries being only of the fifth rank.

If they were directly transferred to and took over various departments of the imperial court now, could these fifth-rank doctors and secretaries be directly upgraded to second-rank ministers?
This also leads to another problem. A Wu State Qingli Si has a Langzhong. If it corresponds to taking over a Ming Dynasty court department, the Langzhong should naturally correspond directly to the Shangshu.

But if the multiple Qinglisi of the Wu Kingdom were merged into one Ming Dynasty department, which doctor from the Qinglisi would be the Shangshu? Which doctor would be the Shilang?
In this way, the official positions were passed down downwards, and those who were supposed to be assistant ministers could only be doctors, and those who were supposed to be doctors could only be directors.

So in fact, the staff of the Qinglisi did not want to be merged into the imperial court department.

At the same time, most people also felt that if none of the positions were merged and all the doctors were directly promoted to Shangshu, there would be more than 20 or even more than 30 Shangshu at once.

Doesn't it seem like there are too many officials and too many titles? This is something that many monarchs are quite averse to.

Especially since the rank of the civil servants in Wu State was originally very low, does this mean that His Royal Highness the Crown Prince is quite averse to indiscriminate appointments of officials to unnecessary posts?

I suggest that Wu's Qinglisi be turned directly into a ministry. Will that not disgust or arouse resentment among His Royal Highness the Crown Prince?

Zhu Jianxuan thought about it for a while without any expression. The officials on the scene also continued to think and deliberate for a while, and then someone spoke up again.

Yao Nai, the secretary of the Secretariat, bowed to Zhu Jianxuan and said:

“Your Highness, I think we can come up with a moderate plan based on the ideas of my two colleagues.

“I think it can be called ‘virtual department, real department’.

"Take the Ministry of Works as an example. The name of the Ministry of Works of the original imperial court will be retained, but the original unified and fixed Ministry of Works will not be used.

“Nominally, the Ministry of Industry and Commerce consists of the Water Conservancy Department, the Industry and Commerce Department, and the Construction Department. However, each of the three departments is located in an independent government office, and each department has a vice minister in charge of the affairs of the department.

“All documents of the three departments were issued in the name of the Ministry of Industry, and they handled government affairs that nominally belonged to the Ministry of Industry.

"If Your Highness feels it is necessary, you can also appoint another Minister of Works to be in charge of the affairs of these three departments."

After Yao Nai finished speaking, the officials around him began to think about it seriously.

This 'virtual department and real department' plan was really a compromise. It retained the Wu Kingdom's original Qinglisi and court departments, but turned the court department into a fictitious institution.

It was just using the name of the imperial court department and the intelligence of the Wu Kingdom's Qinglisi. At the same time, it was actually suggested that it was too exaggerated to directly promote the fifth-rank Langzhong of the Qinglisi to the second-rank Shangshu, because the number was too large, so it was promoted to the third-rank Shilang.

From the fifth rank to the third rank, one can still jump four levels, and still be the de facto highest-ranking official, with no one else suppressing him.

Zhu Jianxuan also pondered carefully for a while:

“Xu Bu Shi Si’s idea is good, and the concept is also good, but there are still some problems.

"The name and duties of the Ministry of Works are retained, but if the officials are divided into three locations, where should the seal of the Ministry of Works be placed?
“If the personnel of the three departments get entangled in the order of using the seals, it will definitely slow down administrative efficiency.

"If three copies of the Ministry of Works' seal are made and three officials are in charge of the seal, there will inevitably be confusion in the management of the use of the seal.

“So let’s just use the actual department.

“The Metropolitan Waterworks Department, the Industry and Commerce Department, and the Construction Department were merged into the Ministry of Industry, which was then split into two departments, the Waterworks Department and the Construction Department. The new Ministry of Industry assumed the responsibilities of the former Industry and Commerce Department.

“For other Wu State Qinglisi and court departments, if the responsibilities of both parties can basically match in a one-to-one or one-to-many situation, they will be integrated in this way.

“Using the existing institutions of the central court as the framework and foundation, the personnel who bear the corresponding responsibilities of the Wu State were transferred to the court institutions, and then a new department corresponding to the Wu State Qinglisi was established.

“In fact, most of the personnel have already been matched, and now they are just going through the process on the documents.

"The imperial edicts issued to the localities were based on our adjustments to the original court institutions, letting them know that we had established a number of new departments based on the original institutions.

“However, if all the Wu Kingdom’s departments are replaced by the imperial court’s ministries, there will be too many ministries in the imperial court.

“This department is actually responsible for the same things that the assistant ministers used to be in charge of.

“So the chief officer of the ministry is a third-rank assistant minister, not a second-rank minister.

"The Cultural Department, the future Ministry of Rites, will select another official title, to serve as the assistant minister and assistant official of the ministry, with a rank of fourth rank.

“The position of Shangshu is still retained, but it is no longer a fixed official in the quota.

"The appointments and dismissals are adjusted at any time according to the situation, and they are responsible for coordinating multiple departments to deal with specific government affairs."

Zhu Jianxuan stated the arrangement so directly, and the staff of the Secretariat immediately wrote it down.

This arrangement can be considered as another compromise.

The Wu State's Si was directly transformed into a ministry of the imperial court, but the rank of this ministry was downgraded by two levels.

The original institutions of the Wu State were retained, but their names were all changed to those of the original court style, and at the same time as few edicts as possible were issued to adjust the institutions.

Zhu Jianxuan paused for a moment, and continued to make arrangements for the integration of other different types of official positions based on the established principles:

"The existing institutions of the Wu Kingdom cannot completely correspond to the institutions of the imperial court. We should first adjust the personnel that can correspond, and then adjust the responsibilities of the institutions. There is no need to issue imperial edicts to the local areas.

“All the secretaries of the Secretariat were transferred to the Cabinet as Grand Secretaries, and the rank of Grand Secretaries was directly raised to the third rank.

“The staff of the Secretariat were transferred to the Hanlin Academy, first taking over the original responsibilities of the Hanlin Academy, and then adding staff to manage officials at all levels of government offices.

"The cabinet is responsible for coming up with a specific plan on how to manage the staff of future court officials.

“At the very least, it should be required that all staff members must register with the agency under the Hanlin Academy Secretariat, otherwise both the owner and the staff member themselves will be guilty.

“If it is mandatory that staff must be selected by the Secretariat and officials are not allowed to hire staff privately, we should discuss whether it is feasible.

“In addition, the Wu Kingdom had its own government offices, but the imperial court did not have a corresponding functional agency, so a new agency was established separately.

“For example, the Privy Council could be established based on the Privy Council staff.

"The General Staff Department, the Teaching Department, the Military Order Department, the Military Law Department, the Military Merit Department, the Ordnance Department, the Logistics Department, and the Audit Department under the Wu State Privy Council were all directly changed to ministries under the Privy Council.

“The Army Department and the Navy Department were abolished, and their personnel were transferred to the Governor’s Office, which was responsible for military training and combat command tasks within their respective jurisdictions.

“The Privy Council should make a plan to readjust the number of governorates and redivide their jurisdictions.

(End of this chapter)