Ming Dynasty: Teaching The Prince Dragon-Slaying Skills At The Beginning

Chapter 863: Bottom-Up Supervision, The Essential Role Of Daming Daily [Please Subscribe, Please Sub

Going back to the upper-lower information channel, like the middle- and lower-level officials just mentioned, they use the benefits decentralized by the country to the people and claim that they are the benefits they have won for the people.

The common people at the bottom have no really useful way to verify the authenticity.

For example, ask for confirmation from a higher-level official of the relevant middle- and lower-level officials?!!

Not to mention whether ordinary civilians know who the higher-level officials of the relevant middle- and lower-level officials are, even if they know it, they can go and verify it.

Officials at a higher level who are more kind-hearted can just kick them out and leave it at that.

Those who are more disgusting can directly beat the petitioners to serious injuries and then throw them out, or directly throw them into the prison, and notify the relevant officials at the next level to come and pay the money to collect them.

It's also normal.

Because the common people's upward request for verification is a petition beyond the level!

Petitioning beyond one's level has been a taboo in China's officialdom since ancient times.

No official would want to see the people under his rule go beyond the level to petition.

Because once there is an incident of petitioning beyond the level, then oneself will be stained with poor governance in the eyes of the upper-level leaders.

After all, if you govern well and the people below believe you, how can you go beyond the level and visit Japan for verification?!!

Therefore, in order not to affect their political performance and career, once the relevant middle- and lower-level officials know that there are people under their rule who want to petition for verification beyond their level.

Then they will definitely try their best to suppress such bad behavior that will affect their future political performance and career.

For officials at a higher level, they also do not want to see petitions happening beyond the level.

One is that the people at the bottom do not trust the middle- and lower-level officials, so they leapfrog their superiors to petition themselves.

So if the people at the bottom still don't believe it after their own treatment, they won't go beyond the tenth-level officials again?

If the people at the bottom really jump up the hierarchy to petition the higher-level officials above them.

Then not only the future political performance and career of the original middle- and lower-level officials will be affected, but even their own future political performance and career will also be affected!

Second, cross-level petitions increase the workload of higher-level officials out of thin air and interrupt the normal work flow.

Because according to the normal work process, if there is a problem for the people at the bottom, it should be solved by the middle and low-level officials.

If the middle and low-level officials cannot solve the problem, then report it to yourself, and then you will consider in detail how to solve the problem.

But if the people at the bottom directly petition themselves, then it becomes that they need to directly solve the problems of the people at the bottom.

If there are only one or two people who cross-level petitions, then maybe I can still accept it, and I can still find time to arrange and solve the problems raised by the people who cross-level petitions.

But if all the people are dissatisfied with the answers and solutions provided by the relevant middle- and lower-level officials, and then all of them leapfrog the hierarchy to petition themselves.

Then all the responsibilities and tasks that the middle and lower-level officials should bear have fallen on themselves in disguise.

In other words, I, a higher-level official, assumed the original role of a middle- and lower-level official!

This not only delays the responsibilities and work that officials at this level should have undertaken, but also makes the original middle- and lower-level officials stagnant and unable to play their due role.

So in the end, it may be said that officials are protecting each other, or it may be said that it is to maintain the normal work flow.

Once a common person at the lower level crosses the hierarchy to petition a higher-level official, the higher-level official will most likely send him back, leaving the common people to find the middle- and lower-level officials involved to handle the matter.

Or they could detain the person and then notify the relevant middle- and lower-level officials to come over and pay the money and take the person back for processing.

As for why they have to pay, the leading officials at the higher level kindly helped cover the pot for the middle- and lower-level officials [It is also appropriate for Zhongxiaokang's Chongdong to pay ten times of filial piety.

Only the officials at the middle and lower levels made such a fuss that even the officials at the higher level could not stand it.

For example, the kind that arouses large-scale public dissatisfaction, so that higher-level officials may accept petitions from ordinary people and then deal with them directly.

And if it is not possible to seek confirmation from the higher-level officials of the relevant middle- and lower-level officials, is it possible to go directly to the capital to petition the emperor?

After all, the emperor should not protect his officials from each other, or should he not accept petitions from beyond the level to maintain normal work processes?

Generally speaking, this is not the case.

Because the emperor is not a member of the official class, he naturally does not need to be protected by officials.

In addition, the emperor's duty is to arrange and assign tasks to subordinate officials, and then urge them to complete them well.

The petitions of ordinary people below are actually a good opportunity to check whether middle- and lower-level officials have completed their work according to their requirements.

Therefore, as long as the emperor is not particularly fatuous, if ordinary people petition the emperor in the capital, the emperor will listen carefully.

Then arrange for people to solve the problem, and then take the opportunity to beat the officials to stop them from acting too recklessly.

However, the journey from the local area to the capital can range from hundreds of miles to thousands of miles. How many ordinary people at the bottom can overcome the obstacles of local middle- and lower-level officials to reach the capital and appear in front of the emperor?

How many ordinary people are willing to go all the way to the capital to seek confirmation from the emperor just for a question?

No!

It can be said that there is not one!

As long as we weigh the manpower, material resources and effort required to go to the capital and go to the emperor for verification, ordinary people who want to continue to live a good life with their own family will give up this option.

There is only the kind where the whole family may have been unjustly accused and died, and only one of them is left.

Only those who have no thoughts of survival other than avenging their loved ones and overturning the verdict for the rest of their lives are likely to embark on this path of petitioning the capital.

Moreover, there are countless things said by middle- and lower-level officials. Can the people at the bottom really go to the capital and go to the emperor to inquire and seek confirmation?

This is naturally impossible!

Therefore, in the end, the people at the bottom have no other choice but to fully believe what the middle- and lower-level officials say.

And all of this, in the final analysis, is that there is no cost-effective way for the people at the bottom to bypass the middle- and lower-level officials and directly contact the top of the country!

What Daming Daily now provides is such a method.

The policies and edicts at the top of the country are directly described in the simplest and clearest Dabai dialect, which is not only conducive to improving the openness and transparency of government affairs in the Ming Dynasty.

In this way, when the officials at the middle and lower levels interpret the policies and edicts of the highest level of the imperial court to the common people.

The people at the bottom can also have a simple, convenient and fast way to confirm whether the interpretation of the relevant middle- and lower-level officials is correct.

For example, if a certain place is hit by a disaster and no grain is harvested, the court announces that the local people will be exempted from taxes for one year.

This policy is clearly written in black and white in the Ming Dynasty Daily.

However, local middle- and lower-level officials said that the court had changed its mind again and would continue to collect local taxes.

When the local people saw it, they thought this was wrong. Didn’t the Ming Dynasty Daily say that our taxes would be reduced or reduced?

Come on, let's tie up these dogs and go to the capital!

The Ming Dynasty Daily said that if local officials still collect taxes as usual, then we should tie up these dog officials and send them to the capital to be punished by the emperor!

Don't think that the common people dare not tie up these middle and lower-level officials. After the disaster, the common people have already experienced extremely difficult times.

If you continue to collect taxes at this time, it will be equivalent to driving the people to death!

If you kidnap an official without permission, you may die!

But if you have to continue to pay taxes without harvesting any grain, that is death!

Just as Chen Sheng and Wu Guang said in the past: "If you die now, you will die, if you make great plans, you will die; if you wait for death, the country will die"?

They are going to die anyway, let alone kidnapping officials. Even if they want to rebel directly, the people will not dare.

What's more, Daming Daily clearly told them that if local officials increased taxes without authorization, they could kidnap the officials to the capital.

With the imperial power and court endorsement represented by the Ming Dynasty Daily, these disaster-stricken people will no longer be afraid.

Therefore, when the Ming Dynasty Daily can be distributed to every village, the underground officials want to sell it as before.

It is not so easy to use one's own official words to arbitrarily interpret and misinterpret the policies and edicts of the highest level of the country's imperial court.

In addition, Daming Daily can also play a bottom-up supervisory role.

For example, a certain place was hit by a disaster, and the court allocated funds to buy grain to provide disaster relief.

One million shi of grain, but with officials plucking the geese along the way, only 100,000 shi of grain would be left in the disaster area.

If there was no Daming Daily, even if the common people knew that the court had provided disaster relief, they would not know how much food the court had provided.

The middle and lower-level officials said that the imperial court only provided 100,000 shi of food for disaster relief, and they could only believe that the imperial court only provided 100,000 shi of food for disaster relief.

But after the Ming Dynasty Daily was published, the emperor and the court clearly stated in the Ming Dynasty Daily that the court had provided a total of one million shi of food for disaster relief.

After deducting the consumption of the driver's labor along the way, the final amount delivered to the victims should be 900,000 shi of food.

If there are not 900,000 shi of food delivered to the victims in the end, then there must be corrupt officials taking advantage of it.

Even the victims and people are greedy for life-saving food. Such corrupt officials are causing harm to the country and the people. Don't be polite to me. They first ransack their homes and then opened their treasury [then ask for food with hundreds of words.

Finally, try not to beat these corrupt officials to death and bring them to the capital to see me.

After I investigate in detail, I will execute these corrupt officials with 3,600 knives to vent your anger!

This is equivalent to delegating the power of supervision to the people at the bottom, allowing the people at the bottom to form a bottom-up supervision of the middle and lower-level officials!

Under such circumstances, if there are still officials who dare to embezzle money and provide food for disaster relief.

Then these victims and people who are waiting for the court's disaster relief food to save their lives will definitely be aroused and destroyed.

At that time, it would be normal for people to directly kill disaster relief officials in a rage.

In fact, this is what the emperor and the court wanted to express through the Ming Dynasty Daily:

Although you are corrupt, after the corruption, I will directly use your heads to vent the grievances of the victims and win the hearts of the people!

Let’s see whether embezzlement of money and food is more important to you, or whether the lives of the whole family are more important to you!

Therefore, if a disaster relief official does not want to be beaten to death by the angry victims as a corrupt official, then he must ensure that the 900,000 stone of disaster relief food in his hands is only a lot more!

In other words, he cannot be greedy for ink!

Of course, he himself may be able to avoid being greedy, but what if the officials before him are greedy?

?

Naturally, he immediately reported to the emperor and the court, explaining that after the court's disaster relief food arrived at his place, "the loss" far exceeded original expectations.

Ask the emperor and the court whether they will "supplement" 900,000 shi of disaster relief food for the second time?

The meaning of the words is: When the court's disaster relief food was distributed to me, there were only 700,000 shi left.

I don’t know if someone in front of me was greedy for ink, but I definitely wasn’t greedy for ink.

The disaster relief food I have now is far less than the 900,000 shi mentioned in the Ming Dynasty Daily. Will the emperor and the court want to add some more disaster relief food?

Otherwise, I cannot give 900,000 shi of food to the victims, and I will be beaten to death by the victims!

At that time, the emperor and the court can trace back from this official to see how much disaster relief food was received when the officials at the level above him took over the relief food.

If the upper-level official also said that he was not corrupt, he would get 700,000 shi of grain.

Then they ransacked his house for not having enough food to go to the Qin court for disaster relief immediately, harboring corrupt officials, dereliction of duty, etc., and then continued to trace the case to higher-level officials.

Tracing this layer by layer will eventually lead to the corruption of officials who embezzled food for disaster relief in the first place, and then their homes will be ransacked to demand back the money and food they embezzled, and then they will be executed in order to appease the grievances of the victims.

Either there was a corrupt official who took all the blame, and then the emperor also ransacked his house, demanded back the corrupt money and food, and then executed his entire family to appease the grievances of the victims.

What should I do if I can’t get back the corresponding corruption money?

That means that in addition to this official, there are other officials who have also been corrupted. Otherwise, how could they not get back the corresponding money and food?

Or, other officials with evil intentions secretly stepped in to make up for the embezzled money and food.

Or, the emperor would continue to trace the situation upward until he confiscated the families of other officials and made up for the embezzled money and food before stopping.

Regardless of whether it is the former or the latter.

In the end, all the embezzled money and food can basically be recovered, and the grievances of the victims will be calmed, and they will trust and love the emperor and the court more.

Even if the income from confiscating houses is included, maybe the emperor and the court can still make a small profit.

And this way of people at the bottom supervising middle- and lower-level officials, middle- and lower-level officials supervising middle- and upper-level officials, and middle- and upper-level officials supervising the top officials is what the Ming Dynasty Daily has done (

Zhao Qian's) bottom-up supervisory role.

In addition, using Dabai dialect to describe various policies and edicts implemented by the country's court in Ming Daily will also help Ming people better understand and accept the country's policies,

make.

Like those officials, they really like the country to promulgate policies that are obscure and difficult to understand, and that will cause headaches for ordinary people at a glance.

Similarly, those officials themselves also like to promulgate policies that are obscure and difficult to understand, and that will cause headaches for ordinary people at a glance.

Because, as long as the people can't understand it, the final interpretation of the policy rests with them!

For example, if it rains, guests will be welcome, and if it’s rainy, guests will be left alone.

This sentence can be interpreted as:

A rainy day keeps guests, but a rainy day keeps no one.

A rainy day, a guest day, a guest day or not?

It’s a rainy day, it’s a day to welcome guests, or not? Stay!

So what exactly is it about retaining people?

Or leave no one behind?

The people are not sure, but the officials can interpret it according to their own needs.

However, such an interpretation is sometimes contrary to the court's original intention.

For example, the original intention of the imperial court was: On rainy days, guests will be accommodated, but on rainy days, guests will be accommodated.

But the officials interpreted it as: It’s a rainy day, a day for guests, or a day for guests? Stay!

This would cause trouble for the emperor, the court, and the people at the lowest level, and would give relevant officials an opportunity to make profits.

Therefore, the emperor and the court directly told the people in the Ming Dynasty Daily in simple and clear Dabai words: When it rains, guests will be invited, but when it rains, people will not be left behind.

In this way, it will be much easier for the people at the bottom to understand and accept it, and it will not be so easy for other officials to misinterpret it.

If the words spoken by the emperor and the imperial court in the Ming Dynasty Daily were all made up of nonsense words that the common people at the bottom could not understand.

Then it means that the emperor and the court began to regard the common people not as human beings, but as cattle and horses.

That's why we have to use "something" that ordinary people can't understand directly to deceive and exploit people at will.

At that time, the people at the bottom should think carefully about whether the emperor and the court are still the emperor and the court who care about the people. .