In June of the 33rd year of Qianlong in the Qing Dynasty, the newly inaugurated Lianghuai Salt Governor You Shiba presented a note to the Qianlong Emperor. It is mentioned in the recital that the predecessor of the Lianghuai Salt Administration, Pufu, had pre-proposed the outline of the 33rd year of Qianlong during his tenure, and the merchants needed to pay three taels of silver for each quotation for public use, with a total of more than 278,000 taels of silver deposited in the treasury.
During his tenure, Pufu also purchased jade, antiques and other items, spending a total of more than 85,000 taels of silver, and the remaining more than 150,000 taels were requested to be confiscated by the internal government.
If you don't already know the place of the "salt monopoly" in the ancient feudal dynasties, this twist and turn may leave you confused. Next, let me explain to you the terminology and background in it.
In ancient feudal dynasties, the "salt monopoly" has always been an important income**. Back then, Guan Zhong, a first-class war expert, once calculated an account for Qi Huan Gong: In a country with a population of 10 million, if there are 1 million taxpayers (there were a lot of homeless people and black households in ancient times, so there were very few taxpayers who were really registered), then each person would collect a poll tax of 30 yuan per month, and only 30 million yuan a month would be collected.
However, if the price of salt is increased by 2 yuan per liter, according to the amount of consumption to maintain the basic physiological needs of normal people, 10 million people (no matter who eats salt, so tax evasion and tax evasion can basically be ruled out) can get a benefit of 60 million yuan.
In the Tube. In "Aquaman", there are statistics on the amount of salt required to maintain the basic physiological needs of normal people: at the end of the month, five liters of salt for the eldest male (adult male) is less than half, three liters of salt for the eldest female (adult female) is less than half, and half is less than half for the sake (child) to eat salt.
The production and sale of salt was a valuable asset of the ancient feudal dynasties, so they would take strong measures to control it. In order to manage the salt market, the Qing Dynasty set up a salt administration, and the power of this position was quite large.
However, the Qing Dynasty set up the only salt administration in the country, how did he manage the salt market in the country? In fact, it is very simple, that is, the implementation of the state-owned monopoly operation and the system of salt merchants subscribing to salt on the basis of tickets.
The Qing Dynasty strictly controlled the production of salt and introduced a salt introduction system, in which merchants obtained salt profits by purchasing salt, and the salt administration managed salt merchants by controlling the amount of salt induced.
Salt has become a scarce resource, and salt officials distribute salt through the amount of "filial piety" (rebates) of salt merchants, which is an "unspoken rule" that everyone knows. However, in the eleventh year of Qianlong, the Jiqing and Huai salt administrations were greedy, not only increasing the amount of salt to increase the bargaining chips for corruption, but also engaged in "** trading" (pre-selling the next year's salt introduction index), and at the end of his term, he pre-sold next year's salt to the salt merchants, earning an extra year of kickbacks, which eventually led to the case East Window Incident.
After more than 20 years at the helm, each salt governor relied on the scarce resources in his hands and the benefits of "kickbacks", and was greedy until You Shipao took office. He may be anxious to make up for the shortfall, or he may be greedy.
As soon as he took office, You Shidi unabashedly solicited bribes from salt merchants from all walks of life, which obviously broke the unspoken rules of officials and businessmen. From the auspicious inauguration of Qianlong in the 11th year of Qianlong to the departure of Pufu in the 32nd year of Qianlong, the rules of government and business for many years cannot be challenged by others.
To make matters worse, these salt merchants had already purchased the 33rd year of Qianlong's salt from Pufu. Therefore, they were unceremonious about You Shipa's direct request for bribes.
This undoubtedly slapped You Shipai in the face. I heard that the salt merchants had a lot of shortcomings, and they had no way to ask for bribes, which shows that You Shidi has no bottom line in doing things. Since the salt merchants did not give him support, he was going to break their jobs.
So, You Shidi decided not to do it or to stop it, and ignited the cannon battle, so there was the beginning of the note.
Although this You Shi has set up officialdom and scheming, he does have a set. He knew that if he reported the matter directly, he would inevitably be criticized for being too blunt. So he played a clever trick: that year, when Jiqing proposed a plan to Emperor Qianlong for pre-sale of salt, although Qianlong agreed to this approach, he put forward a condition, that is, on the basis of the original salt tax, each pre-sale order will be increased by three taels of tax silver.
However, due to the restrictions of transportation information conditions at that time, it was difficult for the imperial court to grasp specific data on how much salt was pre-sold by each salt administration. Therefore, since the auspicious celebration, each salt government has tacitly concealed the additional taxes of three taels and not reported them.
After You Shiba learned of this important secret, he deliberately wrote a note to Emperor Qianlong, knowing that the successive salt officials had never paid the extra three taels of tax and silver to the imperial court, but he took this opportunity to remind Emperor Qianlong of this problem (pre-outline).
After Qianlong read You Shipai's note, he couldn't help but remember that no one had ever reported to him about the excess tax on the pre-sale of salt. He immediately ordered an in-depth investigation into the matter.
After verification, one of the biggest corruption cases in the Qianlong period - the Lianghuai Salt Case finally surfaced. From the eleventh year of Qianlong to the departure of You Shipai's predecessor Pufu, in the past 20 years, successive salt officials have pre-sold more than 300 pieces of salt, and embezzled more than 1,000 taels of tax silver.
What is this concept? During the reign of Qianlong, the annual fiscal revenue of the Qing Dynasty was about 50 million taels. In other words, in the homes of these salt officials, there was a wealth equivalent to more than 20% of the annual fiscal revenue of the Qing Dynasty.
Their wealth is as great as that of a country, and they are truly rich enough to rival a country.
Emperor Qianlong was furious, and all the ** involved in it will suffer the fate of raiding the house and being punished heavily. However, Mr. Ji Xiaolan has a hand. His in-laws, Lu Jianzeng, also served as the salt governor of Lianghuai.
When Emperor Qianlong was preparing to strictly investigate the successive salt officials, Ji Xiaolan knew that the situation was serious, so he sent a messenger to send two gifts to his in-laws - tea and salt. Lu Jian felt very strange, because his family had a lot of money, and he was not short of these two things.
But Ji Xiaolan's move must have a deep meaning. So, Lu Jianzeng began to chant "tea" and "salt" repeatedly, and suddenly he woke up to the fact that the emperor wanted to investigate the salt policy. Lu Jianzeng immediately transferred and hid his property, but all this still failed to escape the eyes of Emperor Qianlong.
In the end, Ji Xiaolan's "riotous operation" was exposed, and he was sent to the frontier, and Lu Jianzeng was also sentenced to beheading. This is the outline of the most egregious corruption case during the reign of Emperor Qianlong - the Lianghuai Salt Case.
Conclusion: Although the "Two Huai Salt Citations" has come to an end, the problems revealed in it are worth pondering. Why did all the salt administrations deliberately conceal the three taels of tax and silver in the past 20 years?
Isn't the household department in charge of state finance aware of the cat? Perhaps, they were also bought. Moreover, even celebrities like Ji Xiaolan were reporting to the ** filthy officials, which showed that the officialdom at that time had degenerated to the extreme.
In other words, no one was spared in this unifying feast, including the supreme ruler Qianlong, whose proposed withholding tax also triggered the frenzied spread of corruption.
Some people believe that the Qianlong era was actually a harbinger of the decline of the Qing Dynasty, and it seems that this statement is not unfounded.