The Head of the Ming Dynasty Spared His Life

"Yes! This old man is right!"

"300 hectares of Dong Wei's house? Hehe, our village has more than 500 hectares of land, all of which are occupied by him!"

"I don't know how much he has, but his house has built a whole village!"

"Oh, that's really lawless."

Hai Rui's anger gradually rose.

He hated the local tyrants and evil gentry the most, oppressing the people.

If this kind of thing came into Hai Rui's hands, it would definitely be to hold down the landlord and beat him to death.

This is also Yan Song's routine - Hai Rui is a conservative, but he is the most impartial and most hostile Qingtian, he came to interrogate the case, and he had to turn Huang Youwei and Dong Wei upside down. Conservative officials would refute it if they wanted to. No way!

Bao Zheng laughed, and said to the old farmer: "He doesn't pay taxes, what does it have to do with you?"

The old farmer smiled bitterly: "Actually, whether he pays taxes or not has nothing to do with us directly, but!"

He sighed and said, "The money, food and taxes assigned by the imperial court to Suzhou have not decreased at all, but will increase every year."

Bao Zheng Hai Rui is an old man, so he understood what it meant when he heard it.

The taxation indicators given by the imperial court to various places are generally based on the amount in previous years, with reference to the disasters and abundance of the place in that year, to maintain a stable level.

Suzhou has a total of only 10 hectares of land, and Dong Wei, a thief, has monopolized [-] hectares, and even occupies the latrine without shitting, and refuses to pay a penny in taxes...

The remaining [-] hectares of land are hard to come by.

Local officials must complete the task of taxation, otherwise the higher-ups will get angry and it will be difficult to explain.

Then, Dong Wei's tax evasion, all Suzhou people can only take the blame for him...

Invisibly, the tax burden of other people is much, much heavier.

An old farmer said angrily: "Before Dong Wei's family got up, I had to pay more than 2 taels of silver every year in taxes, but I could barely maintain it. But after his family prospered, the taxes apportioned on my head rose to 3 taels a year. Too much. I can't live my life now~"

Hai Rui's face became pitch black, even darker than Bao Zheng...

What kind of concept is it that a farm family pays more than three liang of taxes a year?

In the rural areas of Northwest China, one stone of grain only sells for one or two taels of silver. Just paying taxes is enough to buy 3 or 4 stones of grain for the family, enough to feed 2 or 3 people!

For the people in the impoverished areas of Northwest China, this burden is simply overwhelming.

It can be imagined that if there were no local tyrants and evil gentry like Dong Wei who evaded taxes, the common people would not have to bear such a heavy burden...

"It's unreasonable!" Hai Rui was about to explode on the spot.

It's simply deceiving too much, which is tolerable or unbearable!

Bao Zheng hurriedly stopped Hai Rui to calm down, instead of using his unparalleled special skill [true explosion on the spot], he rushed into the government office and killed Huang Youwei and Dong Wei on the spot...

Bao Zheng persuaded in a low voice: "It is not uncommon for corrupt officials, local tyrants and evil gentry to exist in every dynasty and every place. What is strange is..."

He pouted and said to the 30 sit-in protesters and demonstrators: "As the saying goes, you can't clap your hands. People didn't dare to do this in the past, but now they are so radical. I found that things are not that simple. To say the truth behind this The reason is the important content that I will investigate."

. .

Chapter 2055 Dare to talk about reform?Bao Zheng turned pale with fright [5]

When Bao Zheng and Hai Rui came this time, they had already discussed it on the way. Since they wanted to investigate, they had to thoroughly investigate the matter to find out the truth, so as to prevent similar serious confrontation incidents across the country.

The two real ministers of Qingliu and Qing Tian had a vague premonition in their hearts that this demonstration in Suzhou was fundamentally different from any civil uprisings in the past, and they could not be dealt with simply based on past experience.

Hai Rui calmed down again, and smiled at the old man: "That old man, this is not the first day someone evades taxes, and Dong Wei is not the first day fish and meat villagers, so why didn't you make trouble in the past? Didn't you parade?"

The old man took a puff of dry tobacco, looked at the surrounding farmers, and said, "No, we haven't read books in the past, don't we understand these things? We have been kept in the dark by corrupt officials, local tyrants and evil gentry. If there is no Ma Chao’s younger student entered a new-style school, reads books and newspapers, and organizes some kind of society to teach us old peasants, and we are still being cheated by Dong Wei! Pooh!~”

The old man took a mouthful of phlegm and spat hard on the ground.

Hai Rui Bao Zheng knew it.

It was Ma Chao and Ma Tong who encouraged it.

Hai Rui walked into the crowd again, and saw speeches everywhere. Students from the new university were standing on the stage, giving impassioned speeches to the crowd.

Hai Rui's clothes were plain and patched, and he had been farming all the year round, so he didn't need to visit in private at all. When he was thrown into the crowd, he looked like an old farmer, and no one noticed him at all.

Hai Rui walked up to the students and frowned after listening for a while.

What are these students talking about?

"...Fathers and folks! Now my Ming Dynasty has a clear hierarchy. The royal family and the noble family don't have to do anything. They are extravagant and lustful, and they don't have to pay taxes. What about farmers like us? We work hard, but we have to pay heavy taxes for the entire country. It's not fair to suffer hunger! We want movement, we want reform, we want demonstrations!"

Hai Rui and Bao Zheng were terrified when they heard this, their hearts trembled...

reform?

What does this mean?

Have you eaten the bear heart and leopard gall?

You know, Bao Zheng was known as Bao Dapao, so he didn't dare to say anything, and Hai Rui was even more foolish and bold. He even dared to scold the emperor for his donkey temper.

But the two asked themselves, would they dare to say such a thing?

That is, you dare not say such a thing if you are killed.

When Hai Rui scolded Emperor Jiajing, he only dared to scold the emperor alone, saying that the world is not worthy of His Majesty for a long time (people in the world have tolerated you for a long time!), but does he dare to scold the entire royal family and the entire scholar class?