The Sage of Confucianism and Taoism

Chapter 2473 Ministry of Water and Soil

The passage of the Cabinet Self-determination Decree has far-reaching significance, because it means that for the first time, officials have the legal right to self-determination.

Before this, even the smallest power was nominally exercised by the monarch through the hands of officials, even if it was actually the officials themselves who were doing things.

This time, giving the cabinet the right to self-determination is essentially the royal family handing over part of the real power.

This kind of power is easy to hand over, but never think about taking it back. Even if a strong monarch forcibly takes it back, when he dies, the officials will still try their best to obtain these powers.

The queen mother did not realize the real impact of this matter at first. Later, after the scholars on the discussion list slowly analyzed it thoroughly, the queen mother vomited blood and fainted again.

A few days later, the royal family members of the clan house collectively visited the queen mother, and the queen mother fainted again.

Because almost all the royal family members accused the queen mother of making a big mistake, betraying the royal family and the monarch, betraying the imperial power, and even accused the queen mother of having an unspeakable deal with Fang Yun.

However, no member of the royal family dared to go and scold Fang Yun.

Zhao Hongzhuang, who was working far away in Mizhou, had to travel day and night to return to the capital.

The power of the cabinet was weakened, and the power of the cabinet soared.

Because this was almost all due to Fang Yun, other cabinet members rarely made things difficult for Fang Yun's draft, but occasionally fought for some benefits for themselves and their own offices, that's all.

Therefore, the implementation of the left prime minister's decree was very efficient.

However, Fang Yun was not an inexperienced official. After winning over a group of officials, he unceremoniously borrowed the hand of the Ministry of Personnel and jointly with the Supervisory Council to crack down on a group of officials who had obstructed him. Although the highest status of those officials was only the fourth rank, Fang Yun's handling methods were sophisticated and direct, without any omissions. Even their backers could not find any mistakes, suffered losses, and dared not fight back.

Because they knew very well that Fang Yun was making trouble, and whoever dared to stand up and oppose now, Fang Yun would use him to establish his prestige.

In fact, since Fang Yun became the left prime minister, all senior officials have been very careful to avoid becoming the target of Fang Yun's prestige.

Even the left prime minister was forced to leave, and even the queen mother was so angry that she vomited blood. Fang Yun would not be afraid of any high-ranking official.

Among the officials punished by Fang Yun, there was a fifth-rank official of the Honglu Temple, who had a connection with the Chen Sheng family. After being exiled by Fang Yun, he went to the Chen Sheng family to complain, because his grandmother was the cousin of the current head of the Chen Sheng family.

As a result, Chen Jing, the eldest grandson of the Chen family, happened to be there. This person had an old friend with Fang Yun, and he was upright. After learning that the official actually used his power as a diplomat to have some dealings with the Qing Kingdom, he pointed at his nose and scolded him out of the Chen family.

Afterwards, the Chen family used their power to directly seize the official position of that person and exiled him to Zhenyuhai. The means of handling were far more intense than Fang Yun.

The experience of the official made many people who thought they had a strong backstage shudder. In fact, they have always known that any big power that cherishes its feathers is unwilling to make enemies with Fang Yun, who is praised all over the world, not to mention that it will pay a huge price.

Fang Yun's attempt to lure the snake out of its hole failed, but his attempt to shock the tiger was successful, which made his reform particularly smooth.

Fang Yun spent a month and a half to carry out basic reforms in the Ministry of Personnel, and then announced the unification of the naming of government offices, and all government offices under the cabinet were named after the ministry.

This news would have triggered confrontations among the old interest groups, especially the officials of the six ministries, but Fang Yun also added that he would split and add new ministerial-level government offices.

Therefore, a strange scene appeared in Jingguo. It was obviously a huge reform. At present, the impact was far greater than Fang Yun's respect for etiquette and restoration of the Ministry of Personnel, but after the news was released, no official objected.

Because every official realized that if new ministerial-level government offices were to be split and added, a large number of official positions would inevitably be added!

Even Sheng Boyuan, who was the most opposed to Fang Yun, did not express his objection at this moment.

He did not want to offend more than 90% of the officials in Panorama Country!

Soon, Cao De'an was the first to speak out in support, believing that Jingguo was currently in an unprecedented stage of development, and that the current government offices could no longer meet the needs of Jingguo. Fang Yun's reforms were in line with the will of heaven and the will of the people, and were imperative. Anyone who opposed this reform was obstructing the rise of Jingguo.

Cao De'an also said that in order to support Fang Yun, he was willing to start the reform from the Ministry of Revenue.

Later, the assistant prime minister Yang Xuwen also publicly expressed his support for Fang Yun, believing that the reform of government offices was the general trend.

The three phases supported it at the same time, and all officials were reassured.

A few days later, a new ministerial-level government office, the Ministry of Soil and Water, appeared in the history of Jingguo.

The cabinet also quickly announced the functions of the Ministry of Soil and Water. At this stage, the Ministry of Soil and Water is mainly responsible for checking the information of Jingguo's building land, fields, water systems, forests, grasslands, etc.

At first glance, this Ministry of Soil and Water has no special power, but only conducts more detailed exploration, inventory and recording of Jingguo's land resources.

However, this alone is not enough to form a department.

The person who temporarily took over the Minister of Land and Water was Fang Yun's old friend Cai He, who had served as the magistrate of Ji County.

To fill a vacancy, one does not need to serve for a full five-year term.

So, after discussion, the officials of Jing State quickly concluded that this Ministry of Land and Water would be responsible for managing all the land resources of Jing State.

No one spoke out against it, because this Ministry of Land and Water could be said to be split from the Ministry of Revenue. Cao De'an, who had served in the Ministry of Revenue for many years and was now the right prime minister in charge of the Ministry of Revenue, personally came forward to support it, and no one was qualified to object.

Land has always been the core lifeline of all human countries, and no one in power will ignore this.

The scholars of Shengyuan Continent once summarized the chaos of the Han Dynasty and believed that the biggest reason was that the officials at that time could not solve the problems of finance and land.

The officials quietly waited for the changes in the Ministry of Water and Soil, but what disappointed them was that after many days, the Ministry of Water and Soil was just as advertised, only responsible for checking and recording the water and soil resources of Jingguo, without real power.

The only thing that the Ministry of Water and Soil caused was that some officials in Yanzhou obstructed the officials appointed by the Ministry of Water and Soil to check the land, and were impeached by the Supervisory Yuan. The cabinet directly issued a document to arrest them and return to Beijing, and handed them over to the three judicial departments for trial. What shocked the officials the most was that the whole process did not take more than five days, and they were all punished quickly and severely, and no one from the major forces of Jingguo came forward to oppose Fang Yun.

When the officials did not understand why the Ministry of Water and Soil was so powerful, some gossip spread in Jingguo. Before the establishment of the Ministry of Water and Soil, Fang Yun held a small-scale cabinet meeting. The specific content was unknown, but the result was that the upper echelons of Jingguo fully supported the Ministry of Water and Soil.

Therefore, the officials decided that Fang Yun was going to make a move on the land policy.

But after a few days, the Left Prime Minister's Office and the Ministry of Water Resources and Soil still did not issue any relevant decrees, so the officials had to do their own things, but continued to pay attention to the Ministry of Water Resources and Soil's movements.

The officials of Jing State did not know that after Fang Yun obtained the first batch of information on Jing State's land from the Ministry of Water Resources and Soil, he secretly summoned the elders of the Criminal Hall, the Agricultural Hall, and the Industrial Hall with the privilege of the virtual saint, and held a three-hall meeting with the highest level of confidentiality.