Did Liu Jin cause the decline of the Ming Dynasty because of his reforms? Longwan's reforms all imitated him

After experiencing the chaos in the first year of Zhengde, our Zhengde Emperor Zhu Houzhao began to hide behind the scenes and let the eunuch Liu Jin rush forward.

Liu Jin was from Shaanxi, and his surname was Tan. Later, he became the godson of a eunuch named Liu and changed his surname to Liu. Liu Jin did not come into his own until he was 55 years old. Like Wang Zhen, Wang Zhi, and Wei Zhongxian, the eunuch Liu showed extraordinary talents in eradicating corruption, attacking powerful people, and checking accounts. Most literati in later generations interpreted this behavior as a way to eliminate dissidents and establish authority, even if it was for profit. The interests of the country and the people are not considered. The reason is that eunuchs are inconsistent with the etiquette and laws of our country.

From November 1506 to August 1510, these three years and ten months were the period when Liu Jin was in power, and was called the Liu Jin Era. From the word era, we It can be known that Liu Jin took over all the military and political power of the empire during this period, and also had some new ideas and new reform measures. These reforms were mainly concentrated in the Ministry of Personnel, the Ministry of Households, and the Ministry of War. Liu Jin's reform methods were mainly to inspect the accounts and the scope of the inspection. It is extremely broad and covers all aspects of the empire. From a more macro perspective, Liu Jin's reforms are intended to elevate eunuchs to an equal position with civil servants, so that eunuchs can also become members of the imperial bureaucracy. Liu Jin's move is the first of its kind in Chinese history. It belongs to an area that no one has tried before. If it succeeds, it will indeed be an impact on China's political system over the past two thousand years. The conclusion is shocking. It will make China's current situation more difficult. Civilian politics on track have come to an abrupt end, and this kind of dual-headed politics will make China's political structure more stable. Perhaps it can solve the political puzzle of the Ming Dynasty, but the administrative structure created by Liu Jin will bring serious consequences to China's ethics and morality. We still don't know how big the impact will be.

After Liu Jin took power, he first elevated the local eunuchs to the same level as the governors. The local eunuchs could supervise all important local military, political, and judicial affairs. This was equivalent to realizing dual-headed management in each province. Documents sent to the cabinet and ministries must go through the Supervisor of Ceremonies; Liu Jin restored the Hongwu era's severe criminal law against corruption, but the difference from the Hongwu era was that corrupt officials were no longer punished by physical punishment. Punishment should be replaced by economic means. After all, times have progressed; Liu Jin also made many reforms that reflected fairness and humanity. In view of the large number of southerners in the imperial examinations, Liu Jin restricted the admission ratio of southerners and increased Liu Jin also ordered widows to remarry, and those who did not bury dead people in their families would be forcibly cremated. Officials in the wealthy southern provinces could not be held by people not only from their own provinces, but also from neighboring provinces. Officials in the empire began to be swapped between the north and the south. Officials serving as governors of water transport could not have any contact with the provinces along the canal; Liu Jin sent people to clean up the world's fields. He allocated the hidden acres of land to self-cultivated farmers and restricted gentry and military officers from occupying land. He also sent a large number of officials from the inner court, the Ministry of Household Affairs, and the Ministry of War to inspect military camps, military depots, imperial villages, granaries, Caoliang, and salt in Lianghuai and Huaihe Rivers. government, as well as funds allocated from the national treasury.

On the one hand, he cracked down on corruption and underreporting, and on the other hand, Liu Jin did everything possible to increase the revenue of the treasury. In addition to fines, Liu Jin increased the apportionment of silver mines in various places and increased the taxes paid by military camps in various places. This was the final move. What's terrible is that on the one hand, they carried out inspections of military villages and on the other hand, they plundered them. These directly led to the subsequent mutiny and became an inducement for Liu Jin's downfall.

Anhua King Zhu was a king who was granted a title in Qingyang County, Shaanxi Province. People usually know that King Ning rebelled in the Zhengde Dynasty, but they don't know that there was an Anhua King who rebelled before King Ning. People don't understand why there were so many clan rebellions during the Zhengde period, and they also don't understand why a little king who was sealed in the northwest dared to rebel. In fact, this is related to both Liu Jin and Zhu Houzhao.

Liu Jin cleared the farmland and asked military households to pay grain. The northwest was the focus. The local garrison in Shaanxi had long been complaining. When King Zhu of Anhua saw this, he took advantage of the sergeants' dissatisfaction and took advantage of the opportunity to launch an attack. Whether it was Anhua Wang Zhu or later Ning Wang Zhu Chenhao, we all felt very strange. Why did these vassal kings who had no chance of winning do this? Perhaps the only explanation is that the "Huang Ming Ancestor Instructions" is at work. Perhaps these vassal kings really thought that what they were doing was something to be proud of, or whether they really did it for the good of the country is unknown.

One day in April of the fifth year of Zhengde (1510), Anhua King Zhu invited the local guarding eunuchs, general soldiers and others to the palace for a banquet. During the banquet, Anhua King killed a group of local officials. He also led his troops to kill the imperial censor who was the governor of Qingyang, and then wrote a message and sent it to the army commanders in all directions. The slogan in the statement was to eliminate Liu Jin, but it still followed the "Ancestor Instructions of the Emperor Ming". The ancestral instructions that Zhu Yuanzhang painstakingly created not only failed to ensure the stability of the dynasty, but instead became a shackles for future generations.

Zhu's calculation was very good. He found that officers from all over the country were full of complaints about Liu Jin, thinking that everyone would respond one after another, but in fact this was not the case, and no one responded. After Zhu Houzhao received the report of Zhu's rebellion, he ordered Yang Yiqing to lead his troops to quell the rebellion, and Zhang Yong, one of the Eight Tigers, supervised the army. Yang Yiqing was an important minister in the four dynasties of Chenghua, Hongzhi, Zhengde, and Jiajing. He served as the trilateral governor three times, ranging from the highest official to the chief minister of the cabinet. During the Chenghua period, the Mongols moved to Hetao, and the defense of northern Shaanxi suddenly increased. In order to coordinate and respond, Hongzhi During the year, important ministers and governors were appointed to defend the three towns of Gansu, Yansui, and Ningxia, forming a trilateral system.

Halfway through Yang Yiqing and Zhang Yong's counter-rebellion troops, news came that the rebellion ahead had been put down by a guerrilla general, and Zhu himself was captured.

Seeing that the rebellion was over, Yang Yiqing and Zhang Yong turned their horses and walked back. On the way, they had a conversation, which directly determined Liu Jin's fate. Yang Yiqing analyzed the current situation to Zhang Yong and clearly pointed out that the rebellion was caused by Liu Jin's autocratic power. If this problem is not solved, rebellion may be a common option faced by the empire in the future. Yang Yiqing wanted Zhang Yong to come forward and get rid of Liu Jin, but Zhang Yong was not interested in this issue. Zhang Yong said that Liu Jin posed little threat to him personally, and whether Liu Jin was competent or not did not seem to matter to him. Yang Yiqing then said that if Liu Jin was deposed, Zhang Yong might be able to take Liu Jin's place and gain more benefits, and pointed out that the emperor was also dissatisfied with Liu Jin.

In fact, what Zhang Yong was most worried about was the emperor's attitude. Once he failed to beat Liu, he would bite him instead. The example of the three years of Zhengde was already there. It was Zhang Yong who finally made up his mind to defeat Liu. Yong believed Yang Yiqing's judgment on His Majesty's attitude, and he also felt that the time had come for Liu Jin to fall.

In August 1510, Zhang Yong returned to Beijing with King Anhua and held a prisoner dedication ceremony. After the ceremony, Zhang Yong took advantage of Liu Jin's absence and told Zhu Houzhao that Liu Jin was going to rebel, and asked Zhu Houzhao to kill Liu Jin. . After listening to Zhang Yong's words, Zhu Houzhao was silent and still hesitating. Zhang Yong handed Zhu Houzhao another statement about King Anhua's rebellion, and pointed out that the reason why King Anhua rebelled was because of Liu Jin. At this time, other people in the Eight Tigers also They all agreed, and Zhu Houzhao finally ordered the arrest of Liu Jin. A powerful man who was known as the emperor was destroyed because of a few words from the eunuch of the inner court. From this, it can be seen that no matter how powerful Liu Jin is, he is just a pawn of the emperor. Once this pawn is no longer needed , just push it gently.

Although Liu Jin was arrested, he must be charged with a charge. The best charge is rebellion. Once he is convicted of this crime, no matter how he is dealt with, the treatment of Hu Weiyong and Lan Yu was in this way. Thinking of this, the civil servants and eunuchs placed armor, weapons, and reportedly jade seals on Liu Jin's house, and then asked Zhu Houzhao to come and see them. When Zhu Houzhao saw these things, he probably understood mentally that these were officials who had betrayed Liu. They did it, but he didn't say anything, he just went along with the flow.

On August 25th of the fifth year of Zhengde, Liu Jin was executed by Lingchi and mutilated for three consecutive days. A generation of eunuchs disappeared from the historical stage inexplicably and quickly.

Everything about Liu Jin seems to be a mystery, and it is difficult to find answers in history books. We may only be able to derive reasonable historical truth by relying on speculation.

Liu Jin's reforms were huge and involved everything in the bureaucracy. Liu Jin compiled his reform provisions in a book called "Seeing Practices". There were 24 articles involving the Ministry of Personnel, and Household Affairs. There are 30 models from the Ministry of War, 18 from the Ministry of War, and 13 from the Ministry of Industry. The contents are all aimed at the ills of the world. However, after Liu Jin's death, everything about the "Ji Xing Li" was burned by civil servants, and people no longer know about it. What exactly is recorded in "Jian Xing Li" can only be gleaned from other historical books.

After Liu Jin first took power, he had a very good relationship with the cabinet and ministries. He respected Li Dongyang, the chief assistant of the cabinet, and never violated Li Dongyang's suggestions. Li Dongyang also respected Liu Jin. Liu Jin himself had limited knowledge, so he found a scholar Zhang Wenmian. Therefore, when Liu Jin was in power, it was actually Zhang Wenmian who approved the memorials in the world. Not only that, Liu Jin focused on selecting honest officials, so most people from the cabinet to the ministry came from his sect. At this time, the inner court and the outer court had been integrated.

In contrast to the harmonious relationship between civil servants, Liu Jin had a very tense relationship with the eunuchs in the inner court. The other seven tigers in the Eight Tigers all hated Liu Jin. Zhang Yong once fought with Liu Jin in front of Zhu Houzhao, although Liu Jin was feared by people, but the eunuchs in the inner court never took him seriously, and he ended up in the hands of these people who should have taken him seriously but did not. The anonymous memorial written in the third year of Zhengde's reign actually showed the conflict between Liu Jin and the inner court. After the scandal of the memorial, he even established an internal factory to deal with the East and West Second Factory.

In addition to conflicts with eunuchs, Liu Jin's relationship with local officials, the army, and the clan was also extremely tense because of the reform. Before King Anhua's rebellion, a small-scale military riot had occurred in Liaodong. Now we need to find out what is the real reason why Zhu Houzhao executed Liu Jin? The craziness of the civil servants in the first year of Zhengde put the status of Zhu Houzhao, who had just succeeded to the throne, in jeopardy. Later, relying on Liu Jin, the situation suddenly took a turn for the worse. Zhu Houzhao changed from an emperor with no status to being able to get wind and rain, but he only passed. After a few years, he became dissatisfied with Liu Jin. To put it bluntly, the reason was that Liu Jin was too authoritarian, which made Zhu Houzhao also feel that this person was very troublesome. But why Zhu Houzhao executed him in Lingchi is still puzzling.

It seems that Liu Jin came to power due to deviations in the political operation of the Ming Dynasty. Like Wang Zhen, he tried to imitate the Hongwu Emperor and reshape the empire. They were both idealistic people. People with super abilities like Emperor Hongwu are still limited by the length of their lives, let alone Wang Zhen and Liu Jin? Liu Jin's series of measures were too hasty, too violent, and the impact was too wide. Although he was eager to seek treatment, he ultimately fell short. Despite this, the Liu Jin era should be paid attention to by future generations of historians.

Since Liu Jin was a eunuch, no matter what he did, he was not in line with etiquette. After his death, all his reform measures were immediately abolished. There are few mentions in history books, and we have no way of knowing the effects of his reforms. Everything about him was a topic that the scholar-bureaucrats of the empire were unwilling to touch. However, after that, the shortcomings of the empire became increasingly serious during the Jiajing years, and they were eventually difficult to recover from.

1510 is a memorable year, in which the imperial reformer Liu Jin died; 1566 is also a memorable year, in this year Emperor Jiajing died, and then started a war that lasted for 16 years The Longwan Reform, no matter how the history books whitewash the Longwan Reform, it always followed Liu Jin's path; 1582 was also a memorable year. In this year, the imperial reformer Zhang Juzheng passed away. After his death, Like Liu Jin, he was liquidated. From then on, the Ming Empire finally entered an irreversible fate.

In any case, the Liu Jin era is worth remembering for some scholar-bureaucrats or for Zhu Houzhao