On the occasion of rebirth Zhou Sui

Chapter 132 131 Da Suo Mao Yue

Author: He Tiantian from Lotus Picking

Chapter 132 131 Da Suo Mao Yue

In the early days of the establishment of the Sui Dynasty, a population check had been carried out. At that time, Cui Che was still serving as a long history in Yang Guang's Bingzhou Governor's Office. It was the first task he and Yang Guang took over. They relied on data to inflate the land and falsely increased the acres.

, population, presented a satisfactory answer to Yang Jian.

But the source of this population search is the cleverness of some people.

In the Sui Dynasty, men became adults at the age of eighteen and were tax payers until they were sixty years old.

Some cunning people have made a fuss about their age. Young people will be younger, and older people will be over sixty years old to avoid taxes and corvee. This phenomenon is especially obvious in the Kanto region.

Yang Jian learned of this situation and ordered local officials in various states and counties to verify the people under his rule house by house and person by person, and conduct thorough inspections.

The so-called "Dasuo" is to count the household registration, and record the names, dates of birth, appearance and physical characteristics of the registered household members in detail;

The so-called "appearance reading" is to check the appearance of the people one by one with the appearance described in the household registration to verify the identity.

If there is a person whose household registration is false, who deceives his elders and calls himself a junior, the village chief and the party chief will be sent to the frontier.

During the Northern Wei Dynasty, a three-chief system was implemented at the grassroots level, namely the party chief, the li chief, and the neighborhood chief.

The Sui Dynasty inherited the three-chief system of the Northern Wei Dynasty, with five families as one neighbor, five neighbors as one li, five li as one party, and one party having 125 households.

It was not unjust that these li and party chiefs were sent to the frontiers. They were usually responsible for checking household registration, supervising farming, collecting tax acres, and collecting corvee and military service.

If a cunning person really wants to lie about his age, he cannot do without the help of the village chiefs and party leaders. After all, there are only 25 households in a li, and there are only 125 households in a party. They are all door-to-door, so how can they help?

Do you know your true age?

The imperial court also issued an edict at the same time, ordering officials from various places to conduct household analysis for large families, ordering them to live in separate households and establish their own households, and to search for hidden populations.

Cui Che implemented these two decrees truthfully, especially lying about his age and evading taxes and corvee. Such evil behavior was not tolerated at all.

Cui Che believes that honest people cannot always suffer.

He strictly followed Yang Jian's instructions and sent his cronies everywhere to supervise and investigate. Whenever something fishy was found, not only the li leader but also the party leader had his assets confiscated and was sent to the frontier.

Those who lied about their age were severely punished, and the taxes owed over the years were easily recovered. Cui Che also discounted the price of the corvee for them. In addition, they were also fined to varying degrees according to their rich and poor levels.

If the upper household misrepresents their age, a fine of ten times the amount will be imposed, the middle household will be fined five times, and the lower household will be fined three times.

After going through this set of tricks, no matter whether you are in the upper, middle or lower household, as long as you lie about your age and evade taxes and corvee, your family will basically be ruined.

We encountered a flood last year. To be honest, even those who live in upper households, except for powerful nobles, most of them are not very wealthy.

If you sell your property and still fail to pay off the fine, you will negotiate with the local government to repay it in installments over a certain number of years.

Cui Che, who had always shown a friendly image to others, showed no mercy this time. While the people of Qingzhou respected and loved him, they also recalled Cui Che's bloody method of massacring officials the year before, and gained an additional layer of awe.

However, ordinary people did not complain about this, but applauded it.

After all, everyone is of age to pay taxes and perform corvee service. Why can you lie about your age and live comfortably? We have to contribute money and efforts to the country.

As for the second decree, it was to create households for large families, not allowing them to live together and forcing them to form separate households.

Cui Che left this matter to Fang Yanqian to take charge.

Fang Yanqian has been the boss of Qi County for more than 20 years and has a wide network of contacts. With his persuasion, things went smoothly.

In Qingzhou alone, more than 7,000 hidden people were found, while the four prefectures of Qingzhou, including Qingzhou, Jiao, Guang, and Ju, had a total of more than 20,000 people registered.

The data was gradually collected in Daxing City. In the second census, more than 1.64 million people were added to the household registration books.

This time, Kuohu didn't have much success, and the reason was simple. The targets of this inspection were basically local nobles and powerful people. How could the local government blow the numbers to the sea?

Immediately, Yang Jian responded to Gao Jiong's request and promulgated the law of losing nationality to various states and counties.

The law of losing one's nationality refers to the rules for losing one's nationality. On the fifth day of the first lunar month of each year, the county magistrate is required to conduct an inspection and order five or three parties of the people to form a group, divide them into classes according to the rich and the poor, and determine the amount of tax payable.

In the sixth year of Kaihuang's reign (586), which was the last year of Cui Che's term as governor of Qingzhou, on the eighth day of the first lunar month, the county magistrates successively completed the formalities for the transfer of registration and sent them to Dongyang City for review by the governor's office.

Cui Che, however, was not in a hurry to use the seal. Instead, he sent a large number of personal followers to go to the county to investigate, and he really found out what was going on inside.

Unexpectedly, after killing so many corrupt officials three years ago, another major case has been uncovered now.

In order to avoid being designated as upper households, many wealthy families paid high taxes and transferred benefits to county officials, and were actually classified as lower households.

Correspondingly, there will be ordinary families who should be the lower households, but they will be assigned high taxes that are not theirs to bear.

This made Cui Che very angry. He reported the matter to the court, and all the officials who committed the crime were taken to Daxing City, and all the officials who accepted bribes were executed. Some of them were promoted by Cui Che from the refugees.

People who were once bullied by evil officials now end up being despised by others.

As for the wealthy families involved in the case, Cui Che did not let them go. In Qingzhou, he personally led the salt soldiers and went from house to house to confiscate their assets. The remaining three prefectures were also handed over to Wei Yi, Pei Xiu, and Huang Baiji.

Don’t you want to be a householder? Well, I’ll let you be a householder!

After these wealthy families had their assets confiscated, they finally got their wish and became penniless in the real sense.

Only the land allocated by the government can be cultivated to support the family.

When Yang Jian received Cui Che's report, he was furious. In addition to severely punishing the officials sent by Cui Che for accepting bribes, he ordered the governors of various states to review the matter. Many county magistrates lost their official titles as a result.

Of course Cui Che knew that exposing this matter would offend some people, but if he pretended to be deaf and dumb, his conscience would be even worse.

Besides, as the eldest princess's consort and the emperor's favorite, he was not afraid either.

If you stand tall, there will always be people who are jealous. If you are afraid of this and that, why not be an official? It is better to go back to Boling and live a life guarding the 50,000 acres of ancestral land.

In February of the sixth year of Kaihuang's reign (586), Yang Jian ordered that at the end of each year, governors and senior staff from each state would come to the court in turn to report the performance of their state officials in that year, and then the court would evaluate them for promotion and promotion.

Cui Che also serves as the governor of Qingzhou, so he is naturally among them. By that time, it will be the end of his three-year term.

No more today.

(End of chapter)