Tibet

Chang'an, Wude Restaurant.

Dugu Ming held his hand and looked at the flow of people coming and going on the street outside, and sighed: "I don't know when will I come back next time?"

The person sitting opposite Dugu Ming was Liu Yan, the Minister of Civil Affairs. Liu Yan and Dugu Ming had a good relationship. At first, Liu Yan was responsible for contacting the court, while Dugu Ming was doing secret work for Li Ye. The two had quite a lot of contact.

Liu Yan smiled slightly and said: "Ming Gong is going to Quanzhou to temporarily take charge, and he is not going overseas. Why is he so sad?"

Dugu Ming shook his head, "My eldest brother also went to Quanzhou to take charge, but in the end he went to Dugu Island. Moreover, my eldest brother fell ill on Dugu Island. I should go and see him."

"Okay, why did you fall ill again?" Liu Yan asked with concern.

"It's too hot and humid over there, and my eldest brother is too old. His body can't bear it and he falls ill. This time I went to Quanzhou to take his place and let him return to Chang'an to recuperate."

Liu Yan didn't want to interfere in the Dugu family's family affairs, so he changed the topic and asked with a smile: "I heard that the Yu family wants to come back?"

Dugu Ming sneered and said: "I persuaded them at the beginning that they were not rich enough and did not have the ability to develop the island. They did not believe it and thought that we would not allow them to establish a country. Now they understand that it is not that easy."

"They don't have enough financial resources?"

"It has a little to do with it, but not entirely. They thought too well before, thinking that the land was fertile and they could grow food three times a year. But now they discovered that the land on the island is very barren and they can't grow food at all. They feel so disappointed. That’s when I decided to give up.”

"What about the island?"

"What else can we do? The Yu family's island is right next to us, and we took over it."

Liu Yan nodded and filled Dugu Ming's wine glass again, "The land is really so barren that we can't grow food?"

"It's not entirely complete. It still depends on luck. The island of Dugujia is the best. It has a narrow plain three hundred miles long. The land is very fertile and has abundant water and heat resources. So we are preparing to develop rice and sugar cane in the future. As for the Yuan family's island, there are dozens of miles of pepper trees, and they plan to mainly produce pepper. The Changsun family's island also produces spices. In short, it is still rich in various products. Now it is mainly about opening up open space. Build houses and docks.”

"The Yu family's land is very barren, is there nothing?"

Dugu Ming shook his head, "Of course not. I heard that their island is also rich in spices. Their problem lies in fresh water. The fresh water is in the mountainous area. A canal must be dug to lead the fresh water out. They don't have that ability."

Liu Yan chuckled, "I see, it's really a matter of luck. In fact, we can change the island, the court allows it."

Dugu Ming sighed and said: "The key is that they retreated when they faced difficulties. It is not that easy to build a country. It will take several generations of hard work to achieve initial results."

At this moment, the shopkeeper came in and handed a newspaper to Dugu Ming.

This was naturally a tenth issue of the Tang Dynasty. Dugu Ming subscribed to every issue and developed a habit.

He looked at the front page, which read "The Imperial Court's Reform of Local Official Governance Aroused Warm Responses in Various Places."

Dugu Ming handed the newspaper to Liu Yan, pointed to the title and said, "Is it true?"

Liu Yan looked at it, shook his head and said: "Of course the newspaper wants to boost morale, but the fact is exactly the opposite. It should trigger a strong boycott!"

"I just said that the reform of local government cannot be popular. It should be a hard nut to crack!"

Liu Yan nodded, "That's true. The imperial court wanted to return the power of appointing officials to the imperial court, but it was generally resisted by local clans. States wrote letters one after another, hoping to postpone the implementation of local official governance reforms. They were all worried that it would cause riots and be detrimental to Do you think Ming Gong will do it in terms of local governance?”

Dugu Ming sneered, "It's completely alarmist. It's difficult for local clans to control county officials, so they can only control subordinate officials. These subordinate officials may seem to have low status, but they all control real power. They are the defenders of the interests of local clans. The court Once the subordinates are touched, they are actually attacking the clan. How can these clans give up? Of course, they will use all means to confront the court. The state officials dare not say everything, but most of them have benefited, so they naturally have to speak for the local clans. "

Liu Yan smiled slightly and said: "These state officials are also stupid. Don't they know that what they say at this time will be evidence of their collusion with local clans?"

Dugu Ming sighed and said: "It's a pity that I can't see this scene anymore. Dear brother, tell the emperor for me that local officials are frozen three feet and cannot be frozen in a day. You must be patient and have a strategy!"

Liu Yan nodded, "I will definitely tell you!"

The desk in Li Ye's imperial study room was piled with notebooks from various places. In the past few days, he had been reading the notebooks from local governments to see why they opposed the reform of local officials.

The reform of local officials that Li Ye wanted to carry out was still a legacy of the Wei and Jin clans. Since the Sui and Tang Dynasties, successive rulers have been fighting against the clans, and the big clans have gradually been eliminated.

The imperial court used the favor order to force the major families to separate. Each major family was divided into many houses, and each house was independent, and gradually they became irrelevant.

For example, Wei Gao and Wei Jiansu both had the same surname. They were originally from the same family, but they did not come from the same family, so they had no relationship with each other.

But when he arrived at Li Ye's place, Li Ye began to further attack the local small clans in various counties to break their monopoly on local real power.

Why reform is necessary? Because there are huge problems in the local implementation of the abolition of slavery. At the court level and local government level, it is easy to implement the abolition of slavery. No official dares to disobey, and those who violate the law are immediately exposed, and they cannot escape. Lose.

But when it came to the wealthy landlords in each county, the abolition order came to an abrupt halt. After more than a month, only more than 5,000 slaves were abolished in the wealthy counties throughout the country.

The root of the problem was in the registration. The clerks in charge of registration falsified it at will, and the county magistrate could not verify it. Therefore, in the official register, basically every wealthy family had no slaves.

This made Li Ye extremely annoyed, and he was planning to use the inner guards to clean up one by one.

But Li Ye suddenly realized that this might not be a bad thing. By forcing the abolition order to strike at local tyrants, the control of the county was pulled back to the court.

The abolition order is the surface, and the recovery of local officials is the inside. The combination of the surface and the inside is the kingly way to strike at local tyrants.

The appointment of clerks by the court is the final result.

Li Ye was tired of a pile of memorials. They were all the same, which would cause local unrest and was not good for local stability. Li Ye snorted heavily and threw the memorial in his hand aside.

At this time, Wei Gao said at the door: "Your Majesty, Prime Minister Wei, Prime Minister Zhang and Minister Liu are here!"

"Please let them in!"

Soon, Wei Jiansu, Zhang Li and Liu Yan came in, and the three of them saluted together, "Your Majesty!"

"Please sit down, my three dear ministers!"

The three sat down, and Li Ye pointed to the more than 100 memorials on the table and said to the three: "I have read more than 20 memorials, and almost all of them have the same argument, that is, stability and recuperation. It sounds very reasonable, but think about it carefully, am I destroying stability? Am I destroying recuperation? It's just a superficial appearance, but the thieves and whores in their hearts, I don't know how much benefit they have taken, so they speak for the local tycoons."

Wei Jiansu smiled slightly and said: "Your Majesty is right, maybe they themselves are I didn't realize that one person's statement is fine, but if more than a hundred people make the same statement, then there is a problem. I believe they regret writing this memorial now. "

Li Ye nodded and said to Liu Yan: "Take these memorials back to the Ministry of Personnel, classify them, and make a table for me. The horizontal rows are various viewpoints, and the vertical rows are the names of officials. I want to see how many officials are thinking about the court, and how many people have ulterior motives?"

Liu Yan nodded, "I will sort it out when I go back!"

Li Ye slowly said to Wei Jiansu and Zhang Li: "I have been thinking about this issue these two days. On the surface, the court rules the world, but what about in reality? In fact, the local tycoons and the court rule the world together. Everyone, tell me, how to break this situation?"