A variety of political systems in the Han Dynasty followed the Qin Dynasty with slight changes, so there is a saying that "the Han Dynasty inherited the Qin system", and the most significant one should be the unified and centralized political system of the Qin Dynasty inherited by the Han Dynasty. The difference is that the Qin implemented a single county system, while the Han implemented a parallel system of counties and states, and the county system and the sub-feudal system existed at the same time. The existence of the feudal state has always been a threat and challenge to the authority, so from Gaozu, Jing, to the Han Dynasty, the emperors of the early Han Dynasty adjusted the feudal policy, and dealt with the feudal state differently, so that the feudal state continued to be county-like, and the centralization of power in the Han Dynasty was gradually strengthened.
1. Gaozu cut off the king with a different surname and divided the king with the same surname
In the Chu-Han War, in order to win the allies and recruit powerful generals to jointly destroy Xiang Yu, Liu Bang had to divide some heroes with different surnames as kings. In the process of the establishment of the Han Dynasty, these princes with different surnames still had strong military strength, and Liu Bang had to adopt a policy of temporary compromise due to the situation, and formally established the title of knight, the second order, the big king, the small marquis, and implemented the sub-feudal system. Among them, there are more than 100 marquis, and there are eight people in the reign of Liu BangThat is, Han Xin, the king of Chu (first the king of Qi), Zhang Er, the king of Zhao, Han Wangxin, Peng Yue, the king of Liang, Yingbu the king of Huainan, Zang Di, the king of Yan, Wu Rui, the king of Changsha, and the king of Wuzhu of Minyue. At the same time, Liu Bang also implemented the county system under the direct jurisdiction of the county in various places, so that the parallel system of the county and county system and the sub-feudal system coexisted.
But at this time, the princes and kings occupy a large area of land, and the vassal states also have great independence, the most important thing is that they are "different surname" feudal states, and the existence of the vassal states has always challenged and threatened the authority. After the Han Dynasty regime was basically stable, he was worried about the "threat of meritorious heroes", and it took seven years from the founding year of the founding of the country to kill all the kings with different surnames under the pretext of rebellion. In the end, seven of the kingdoms with different surnames divided by Liu Bang, the ancestor of the Han Dynasty, were wiped out, leaving only the weak Changsha Kingdom in the south, but it was eventually cut down because it had no heirs.
Liu Bang's removal of the king with a different surname was not to eliminate the feudal system, but to pave the way for his desire to "have a family in the world". He believed that the reason for Qin's short-lived death was that Qin Weixing had no feudal assistants, so at the same time as "cutting differences"."Dafeng has the same surname, in order to fill the world"., divided a large number of Liu clan children as princes and kings, such as Wu King Liu Biao and other surnamed Jiuguo, want to rely on the strength of the Liu clan as the screen of imperial power. He also killed the white horse as an alliance and swore an oath"If it is not the Liu family and the king, the world will attack it" ("Empress Dowager Lu Benji").。In fact, Liu Bang was very uneasy about his nephew Liu Bi, the king of Wu, who was a little distant, and when he named Liu Bi as the king of Wu, he attached his back and said"In the fifty years after the Han Dynasty, there were chaos in the southeast, how could it be evil? However, the world has the same surname, and there is no rebellion! (Biography of Wu Wangbi).
In addition to pinning his hopes on "the same surname and one family in the world", Liu Bang also took some measures to prevent excessive local power, such as stipulating that the Fu and equal of the kingdom should be appointed by **, and the local feudal state has the right to mobilize the army but has no right to mobilize the army, and must be subject to moderation. These measures taken by Gaozu in the early Han Dynasty did not play an obvious role, and the centrifugal effect of the existence of the feudal state on the centralization of power was inevitable. Although the kings with the same surname still have greater strength and independence, compared with the kings with different surnames, they have much less threat to the world of ** and the Liu family after all. The system of political districts in which feudal states and counties coexisted also played a certain role in resisting the mutual alliance between the princes and kings.
Strictly speaking, the parallel system of the county and the state was established after Liu Bang cut off the king with a different surname and divided the king with the same surname, and changed from the expedient division of different surnames to the conscious division of the children of the clan. At the beginning of the Han Dynasty, there were a total of 54 counties in the country, of which only 15 counties were directly under the central government, and the princely kingdoms accounted for nearly 40 counties; At the beginning of the Han Dynasty, there were more than 13 million people, 1.8 million households in the kingdom, and more than 8.5 million people. Therefore, whether in terms of land area or population, the vassal states of the early Han Dynasty had great strength. Even if it is a prince with the same surname, the threat of centralization also exists, and with the growth of the strength of the feudal state, it is inevitable that the ** regime will restrict, weaken or even cut the feudal state.
2. Wenjing cut the feudal domain, "built the princes and less their strength", and pacified the rebellion of the Seven Kingdoms
During the Wenjing period of the Han Dynasty, the politics of Huang Lao Wuwei was implemented, and with the recovery and development of the social economy, the power of the princes and kings was expanding day by day, and they almost competed with the Son of Heaven. "The big man of the feudal kingdom is a state and a county, dozens of cities, and hundreds of officials in the palace are in the same system as the Beijing division, which can be described as overkill. ”The power of the vassal state is so strong, and the princes and kings are naturally becoming more and more arrogant, "entering and exiting the Son of Heaven", "not listening to the edict of the Son of Heaven", and even sending troops to rebel, which seriously weakens the centralized power and poses a great threat to the imperial power. After Emperor Wen of the Han Dynasty quelled the rebellions of Liu Xingju, the king of Jibei, and Liu Chang, the king of Huainan, the contradiction between the centralization of power and the local separatist forces was still acute, so the people of insight in the government and the opposition actively sought a solution.
Among them, Jia Yi submitted the "Public Security Policy" to Emperor Wen, proposing that the power of the princes must be weakened, and the way is to do it"Many build princes and less their strength"., that is, the descendants of the princes and kings of the present, in turn, divided the fiefs of their fathers, and "the land ended". In this way, the princes and kings are divided more and more, and the fiefs of the vassal states are getting fewer and fewer, and in the end they are unable to confront *** and accept the rule of **. Emperor Wen adopted Jia Yi's strategy and soon divided the state of Qi.
Sixth, the Huainan Kingdom was divided into three, and sealed its son in the Liang State as a barrier.
During the reign of Emperor Jing of the Han Dynasty, the imperial historian made a mistake in the "Policy of Cutting Domains", suggesting that the princes and kings should take the opportunity of violating the law to reduce the fiefs of the princes and kings. He specifically pointed out Liu Bi, the king of WuYi Jiaoyi, that is, the mountains cast money, boil seawater for salt, lure the world to die, and plot chaos. It is the opposite of cutting today, and it is the opposite of not cutting. Cutting it, its counter-urgency, small disaster; If you don't cut it, it's too late, and the disaster will be great" ("The Biography of Wu Wangbi").。Emperor Jing adopted the suggestion of "cutting the domain" and began to cut off some of the fiefs of the guilty princes and kings, and placed them under the direct jurisdiction of **. He first cut off the Donghai County of Liu Wu, the king of Chu, and then cut the Changshan County of Liu Sui, the king of Zhao, and then took six counties of Liu Mao, the king of Jiaoxi. Then, the Han court planned to cut off the fiefdom of Liu Bi, the king of Wu, so the seven vassal states led by Liu Bi set off a rebellion in the name of "punishing Chao wrong and clearing the monarch's side". But the rebellion was put down in just three months. After the failure of the rebellion, the power of the princes and kings was greatly weakened.
Emperor Jing took advantage of this favorable opportunity and adopted a series of methods to weaken and control the princely kingdoms in order to strengthen the centralization of power. First of all, in the old lands of Wu, Chu, Zhao, and Qi, 13 princes were successively crowned as princes and kings, and their fiefdoms were cut, so that they were"Yan and Dai have no northern counties, Wu, Huainan, and Changsha have no southern counties, and Qi, Zhao, Liang, and Chuzhi counties have famous mountains and Haixian, and they are in Han" (chronology of princes and kings since the Han Dynasty). In this way, after the pacification of the Wu Chu Rebellion, the kingdom's fiefdom generally only had one county, which was almost the same as that of Han County.
Secondly, the status of the princes and kings was degraded, and their power to serve as officials was deprived. In the middle of Emperor Jing"The princes and kings are not allowed to reinstate the country, the Son of Heaven is the official, and the prime minister is changed to the prime minister, and the provincial imperial historian, the court captain, the young mansion, the Zongzheng, the doctor official, the doctor, the confessor, and the Lang officials are all detrimental to their members" (Hundred Officials and Ministers)., and through the measures of "the Son of Heaven as the official" and "the internal history of the people to govern the people", the princes and kings were separated from the state government, so that the official system of the kingdom gradually became equal to that of the Han county. This kind"Suppress the princes and depose their officials".("Table of Princes and Kings"), so that the princes and kings lost the power to govern their countries, "not with political affairs", so that the feudal country gradually became a county, and the centralization of power was gradually strengthened.
3. Emperor Wu's "Tui En Order" and "Zuoguan Law" and "Collateral Benefit Law".
The policy of resting with the people of the Han Dynasty gradually restored the social economy, and the rule of Wenjing further developed the society, and by the time of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, the Western Han Dynasty reached an unprecedented period of prosperity. Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty implemented measures to strengthen the centralization of power in all fields of social life such as politics, economy, ideology and culture, such as improving the royal power and restricting the power of the prime minister, so that the Chinese and Korean officials had the decision-making power, and the foreign court officials headed by the prime minister essentially became the executive organs; Implement a new system of electing officials such as probation and recruitment, and appoint doctoral students; the implementation of new financial and economic policies such as currency reform, salt and iron official management, and calculation and refuge; Ideologically and culturally, "overthrow a hundred schools of thought and respect Confucianism alone" and establish a unified state ideology.
In line with all these measures, Emperor Wu continued to weaken the power of local feudal separatism. He accepted the suggestion of his lord father Yan and issued the "Tui En Decree", stipulating that except for the eldest son of the princes and kings to inherit the throne, the rest of the sons were allocated fiefs within the kingdom, as a princely state, and the Han court set the title. Divide the great kingdom into a number of small princes, and henceforth"The princes are slightly, the big country is only more than ten cities, and the small marquis is only dozens of miles, the upper is enough to pay tribute, and the lower is enough to provide sacrifices, so as to assist the Jingshi" (chronology of princes and kings since the Han Dynasty). The feudal state is getting smaller and smaller, and even wants to be strong with Hanjun and others, and it is no longer a threat to the ** regime. Emperor Wu also "made the law of the left official" and "set up the law of collateral benefits". The "Zuoguan Law" stipulates that those who serve as officials in the vassal states have a lower status than ** officials, and they are not allowed to serve as ** officials, so as to prevent the princes and kings from recruiting talents and plotting against them. The "Collateral Law" strictly prohibits feudal officials from colluding with the princes and kings to form parties for personal gain, so as to isolate the princes and kings.
At the same time, Emperor Wu also took advantage of various opportunities to reduce the lords, seize land, and remove the kingdoms of the princes. For example, Liu An, the king of Huainan, and Liu Ci, the king of Hengshan, attempted to rebel and the country was divided into counties; Emperor Wu also took 106 people to seize the title and cut the land on the grounds that the "gold" sacrificed by the princes and kings was not in good condition and the catties were insufficient, accounting for half of the princes at that time; Emperor Wu also set up thirteen assassin histories throughout the country, patrolled and supervised the county, and restricted the "strong sect and the right". At this point, although the princes still exist, but only have to pay taxes on food and clothing, and do not govern the people, the feudal country is no different from the Han county in terms of content and form, and the local administrative district system of the county state in the early Han Dynasty has evolved into a single county system in essence, and the centralization of power has been unprecedentedly strengthened.
Fourth, the gradual strengthening of centralization in the early Han Dynasty
From the king with a different surname who temporarily compromised and divided his rights and interests, to the king with the same surname who was the first emperor of the Ping Domain and intended to divide the feud; From a powerful feudal state that crosses states and counties, to a feudal country that is inferior to counties and counties, and the land is small and weak; From the princes and kings who ruled their kingdoms to the princes who only got the food, clothing, rent and tax: the adjustment of the feudal policy and the different treatment of the feudal state by the emperors in the early Han Dynasty reflected the trend of increasing centralization of power in the early Han Dynasty.
Due to the continuous strengthening and weakening of the local feudal state by the imperial power, the power of the princely kingdoms is declining, the feudal states are constantly being county-like, and the local political district system of the parallel county states tends to collapse, essentially transforming into a single county system. The territory under the jurisdiction of the feudal state has plummeted, and its political status has declined day by day. For example, during the time of Gaozu, Qi had jurisdiction over seven counties: Linzi, Jiaodong, Jiaoxi, Jibei, Boyang, Chengyang, and Langya; By the time of Emperor Jing, among the twelve counties of the Qi State, Qi, Qiancheng, Pingyuan, Taishan, Jinan, Beihai, Langya, Jiaoxi, and Donglai had all been included in the Han County, and only Zichuan, Jiaodong, and Chengyang remained.
Correspondingly, while the feudal state was severely weakened, the number and power of the Han counties continued to rise, and they gradually became dominant in the local administrative system. During the time of Gaozu, there were nine kingdoms and fifteen Han counties. Through measures such as reducing the feudal state and Emperor Wu developing border counties, the number of Han counties in the time of Emperor Zhao had reached eighty-seven, while the kingdom was only seventeen. The gap between the number of counties and states is quite large, and the princes and kings are not allowed to participate in the political affairs of the feudal state, so the appearance of the vassal states is no different from that of the county taishou. In this way, the vassal states of the Han Dynasty realized the countyization in terms of content and form, and the feudal state could no longer constitute a local separatist force that threatened the imperial power.
5. The impact of feudal division and feudal reduction on the local political region system in China
The ancient Chinese patriarchal concept of blood was strong, and in order to defend the imperial power, at the beginning of the dynasty, the phenomenon of voluntarily or forced to divide the princes was not uncommon in all dynasties in China. At the beginning of the Han Dynasty, the implementation of the sub-feudal system drew lessons from the Western Zhou Dynasty and the Qin Dynasty died early because of the long-term separation. However, the feudal system of each dynasty is different, and the power of the feudal king is also different. There are feudal kings in the Han and Wei dynasties who can only pay taxes on food, clothing, rent and no real military and political power, there are feudal kings in the Jin and Southern dynasties who have real military and political power and concurrently lead the town, and there are fictitious feudal kings in the Tang, Song, Ming and Qing dynasties who only have titles but no fiefs. Although all generations are trying to balance the power between ** and local feudal states, the rebellion of the feudal kings is still an endless history, and the rebellion of the Seven Kingdoms, the Rebellion of the Eight Kings, and the change of Jingnan are far-reaching. As a result, almost without exception, all dynasties carried out "cutting feuds" to weaken or even eliminate the princes and kings in order to strengthen the centralization of power. The alternation of feudal divisions and feudal reductions had a great impact on the system of local political districts in successive dynasties.
The actual feudal king who has both a title and a fief will often form an administrative unit that is relatively independent of the local political region, forming an independent kingdom and local separatist forces, which often leads to rebellion due to the excessive power of the local feudal state. After weakening the power of the princes and kings, the original relatively independent feudal state will converge with the ** local political region. After the Han Dynasty Wenjingwu cut the feudal domain, the local feudal states converged with the counties, which was the case. In this way, the feudal state that was originally higher than the local political region will gradually evolve into a part of the ** political region, or even lose to the ** political region, such as the parallel system of the county state in the early Han Dynasty in essence and eventually evolved into a single county system. This process was accompanied by the continuous expansion of the direct jurisdiction and the gradual strengthening of centralized power.
There are only fictitious feudal kings with titles and no fiefs, and the kings are in name only, and they live in Beijing and enjoy their fortunes. Since there is no feudal state in the local area, it naturally does not have much impact on the local political region, which is also in line with the internal requirements of centralization.
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