We have all heard a sentence called "Three years of Qing prefect, one hundred thousand snowflake silver", the meaning of this sentence is to tell the world that being an official in the Qing Dynasty is the same as being a professor in the Republic of China. of. But here is the prefect, and the small magistrate is not only the foundation of the Qing Empire, but also the most difficult official in the world.
As we all know, ancient Chinese scholars and doctors have experienced five eras, namely, nobility-gentry-common people-gangsters-slaves. In the Qing Dynasty, officials became slaves. The slave here is not only the slave of the Aixinjueluo family, but also the slave of all the bosses.
·Why is it more difficult to be a county magistrate in the monarchy era when "the imperial power does not subordinate to the county"
Many people don’t know that in the imperial era of our country, the lowest end of imperial power It's actually a county.
The chiefs, Baojia, and squires below the county level are not government officials, but unplanned personnel who assist county officials in managing affairs.
And the county official, regardless of the official, holds the power of life and death for the entire county.
In the Qing Dynasty, the land area reached more than 10 million square kilometers, and there were also more than 1,000 counties and 23 provinces.
These county officials are not only the direct manipulators of imperial taxation, grassroots stability, legal management, religious belief, education and morality, but also the foundation of the entire empire.
But the funny thing is that the county magistrates in the Qing Dynasty did not get a basic salary until the Yongzheng period, which is the so-called "nourishment of integrity", only 600-2000 taels a year.
But a county official only needs to pay 10,000 to 30,000 taels a year to "filial piety" to the lords at all levels, which is a full ten or twenty times his salary.
Moreover, it is incredible that the county magistrate has only one person to have a salary, and all office and living expenses such as his master, servants, housing, living, office, travel, etc. need him To pay.
What's even more frightening is that the county magistrate not only has a bunch of masters to wait on, but also may be dismissed and investigated at any time if he fails to complete the task, or even lose his head.
In the face of these problems, how did the county grandfather solve them?
·The county magistrate of the Qing Dynasty living under the dual identities of "emperor" and "minion"
County officials were originally like "Fan Jin" and "Zhen Shiyin" The same scholar, they neither have the ability to manage the people of a county, nor the experience of managing the affairs of a county.
But Li Hongzhang said, "The best thing in the world is to be an official."
What the emperor wants is not the ability of county officials, but obedientness, otherwise, the "donation system" would not have been implemented since the Qin Dynasty.
In the Qing Dynasty, 30% of county officials were “donated” with money. Just like Ge You in "Let the Bullets Fly", after spending money to "donate" an official, he must go to a place at least 500 miles away from his home to take up his post. There are emperors and various lords on the top, and the gentry class below is more powerful than the emperor. How the county official can survive in the cracks and successfully earn money is indeed an art.
County officials in the Qing Dynasty had to form their own team in order to cope with their superiors.
Specifically, the magistrate himself rarely does anything, and almost all the work is done by the master.
Master is divided into "Red Bi Master" and "Black Bi Master", which are equivalent to the company's "Internal Account" and "External Account".
The red pen master is responsible for dealing with the superior, and the black pen master is responsible for dealing with the subordinates and making money for himself.
And what is the most important job of the county magistrate? Knocking his head more and talking less, and wait for the superior. As long as you can be a loyal lackey of the emperor and superiors, you can get promoted and get rich!
As for the management, let’s take an example. When an overseas merchant ship in a coastal county was robbed of its cargo by coastal residents due to an accident, Shi Ye simply changed "commercial ship from sea" to "commercial ship from sea" to solve all problems.
As for solving these cases regularly, the master can catch a bunch of "court felons" at any time.
Zhou Xingchi’s famous "Changwei case", and later "Yang Naiwu Xiaobaicai case", "Yang Sanjie case", etc., all of them are more wronged than Dou E .
But for county officials in the Qing Dynasty, solving the problem is the most important thing.
Among the 10,000 unjust, false, and wrong cases, has one of them been found?
And the "Yang Naiwu Xiaobaicai case" was taken seriously because Cixi wanted to use this case to suppress the officials of the increasingly rampant "Hunan Army faction", which was a tool of internal fighting.
Moreover, the funny thing is that if the Qing Dynasty wanted to leapfrog the lawsuit, it had to fight for fifty bans. Most of the time, before the plaintiff could speak, he was beaten to death by the gang.
Everyone is an official, of course you know why you want to do this.
Moreover, there are filial piety from bottom to top. Pull out the radish to bring out the mud. Who wants to find uncomfortable for themselves?
Don't look at the county official's junior high school, you will kowtow to anyone when you see it. It is the grandson of the official.
But on his one-third acre of land, he is the real "emperor".
How did the county magistrate in the Qing Dynasty make money
Do you dare to think, can you think? In the Qing Dynasty, the agricultural tax collected from the people by the imperial court was one stone of grain a year, but when it reached the bottom, it became 2.5 or even 3 stone.
In some county straight streets, the "fire consumption" fee is levied to 30%, which is a tax of one hundred yuan, and you have to add an additional 30 yuan for the loss.
Moreover, the strange thing is that regardless of Tang, Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing, the county officials of every dynasty played this way. The above also knows, but no dynasty can solve this problem.
But if the officials are only allowed to eat according to their salaries, then they have to work hard to study and become grandchildren, so why? Such unspoken rules were called "bad habits" in ancient times.
is described in detail in the series "Li Wei as an Official" played by Xu Zheng. Even the materials used for disaster relief were stripped of layers during the Qing Dynasty, and they were done in a fair manner. The court is not stupid. If these grassroots county officials are not fed, who will serve the court?
If everyone is honest, then the emperor is in danger. In the monarchy era, isn’t the royal family himself the most greedy?
In order to accomplish the tasks assigned to them and to make money for themselves, the county magistrates of the Qing Dynasty used various means to snatch the common people and do all kinds of detrimental activities.
And the entire bureaucratic system of the Qing Dynasty operated in this chaos.
Moreover, if you look up the various princes and rules that the Qing dynasty enacted on the magistrates, they are so harsh and abnormal.
But no matter how good the regulations are, people will enforce them. Everyone of us knows what Aixinjue Roche looks like!
In addition, what the author wants to say is, is this only the magistrate of the Qing Dynasty? No, it is true in all dynasties.
There is no essential difference between Tang, Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing, whether Ming fans, Tang fans, Song fans, really let them return to that era to live, they probably do not know how they died.
In a word, if that era is really good, it will not be eliminated by history!
Regarding the dual identities of the county magistrate in the Qing Dynasty, that is, grandson and grandfather, what do you think of the reader?
