Tibet

Before dawn the next day, Li Ye, protected by hundreds of guards, returned to Chang'an on horseback.

An hour later, Li Ye was sitting in his imperial study room.

A New Year's holiday was very short, and the memorials on the table seemed to have been read yesterday. Li Ye flipped through them. Normally he would not let memorials celebrate the New Year, but this time he placed two memorials to celebrate the New Year.

It is also because these two memorials are special. One memorial is the draft of this year's imperial examination. Li Ye put forward a suggestion after last year's imperial examination. When the level is equal, he hopes that the admission will be biased towards the children of poor families.

In response to his own suggestions, Zhengshitang proposed a differential admission plan. If 100 people were admitted today, the number would be reduced to 110 after the provincial examination of the Ministry of Rites, and then the number would be divided between 91 and 110. The order of names is determined, and the ranking is slightly biased towards the children of poor families.

But Li Ye felt that this plan seemed unfair, so he had to think about it.

Li Ye wrote to approve his idea and divided the names between ninety-six and one hundred and five, and the children from poor families were shortlisted.

If the scope is smaller, it will be basically fair.

Another memorial was a proposal put forward by Yan Zhenqing to abolish the Internal Guard. The proposal stated that the Internal Guard was originally established to deal with the destruction of various hostile forces. It was indeed necessary. However, with the unification of the world, the hostile forces have disappeared, but the Internal Guard But his power is getting stronger and stronger, making Chang'an and the people of the world fear him.

A small case that could have been solved by the county government ended up being solved by the internal security guards. When the case got bigger, the family often ended up being ruined.

"The world is in conflict, but the inner guard still has 20,000 troops. Now that the world is peaceful, the inner guard has 40,000 elite troops. Who is its enemy?" Your Majesty had no intention of doing so, but the tyrannical situation has begun to appear. The people's color changed when they heard about it, and they hid when they saw it, and the internal guards were rampant in Chang'an. This is by no means a scene of peace and prosperity."

This memorial caught Li Ye by surprise. When did the inner guards become rampant in Chang'an? When did the internal guards intervene in county government affairs again? When did internal guarding become tyrannical rule?

After thinking for a moment, Li Ye pulled the rope. After a moment, Wei Gao appeared at the door, "Please give me your Majesty's orders!"

Li Ye waved, "I want to ask you a few words!"

Wei Gao stepped forward and stood with his hands down. Li Ye asked, "Are you a local?"

Wei Gao nodded, and Li Ye asked again: "Do you usually drink outside with your friends?"

Wei Gao hesitated and nodded. There was no need for him to lie about this kind of thing.

"Do you think the internal guards are disturbing the people?" Li Ye asked.

Li Ye saw that he was a little hesitant, "I want to hear the truth, otherwise what would I do if I asked you?"

"To report back to Your Majesty, the reputation of internal guards among the people is indeed not very good."

"Tell me more about it!"

"Weichen told me something. Weichen had a good friend who was a classmate. His father-in-law opened a pharmacy. A patient was critically ill, so his family came to buy him ginseng to keep him alive. As a result, the patient died, and the family stopped working. He thought that the drug store was selling fake ginseng, so he went to the internal guards to file a complaint, saying that the drug store was selling fake medicines. The internal guards sealed the drug store, arrested the person and tortured him, but no evidence was found. So his classmates and friends came to communicate with me and took the person first. He let him go, but when he returned home, his father-in-law was angry and resentful, and was seriously injured. He died within three days. In the end, no evidence of selling counterfeit medicines was found, so the matter was settled and there was no punishment for the false accuser. "

"What else?"

"Also, His Majesty does not allow officials to engage in prostitution. This should be a moral matter. There is no such article in the laws of the Tang Dynasty, so it should be impeached by the Yushitai, but the internal guards intervened. Officials were drinking in restaurants, even if they were called a few If a singer comes to sing a song for fun, the internal guards will arrest the person, imprison him for a night, and fine him ten thousand dollars. This is a common occurrence and is deeply disgusted by middle and low-level officials. "

"So what do you think the problem is?"

"The humble position believes that the internal guards have too much power and can do whatever they want. As long as they say they suspect selling illegal salt or contraband in any store, they can go in and investigate without any evidence, and they can arrest people. They will be investigated. Will your family be ruined, or should you just let it go? It all depends on whether the store is willing to pay a large sum of money for bribes.

There is competition between two shops. As long as one shop is willing to spend some money and make up some stories, the internal guards can kill the competitors for them. Your Majesty, the various practices of the internal guards have already caused public dissatisfaction, but there is nowhere to redress the injustice. "

Li Ye walked two steps with his hands behind his back: "If I want to personally experience the practice of internal defense, is there any way?"

Wei Gao thought for a moment and said, "There is a way!"

Li Ye immediately informed him that he was going to Xingqing Palace at noon.

He immediately left the palace in a semi-old carriage and headed for Chunming Gate. Sure enough, when Li Ye arrived at Chunming Gate, he found that Chunming Gate had been blocked by the internal guards and no one was allowed to enter or exit.

Thousands of people gathered at the city gate. They were all jumping and cursing, but it was no use. The city gate would not open, and no one explained to them when it would be opened.

If it had been explained earlier that they would have to wait for an hour and a half, many people would not have waited and would have gone directly to the south to leave the city.

Li Ye's face suddenly looked a little ugly. It was now 8:30 in the morning, and there were still three hours before he was going to Xingqing Palace at 11:30. The city gate was blocked, which meant that if he went out, the city gate would have to be at least Was blocked for three hours in advance.

He immediately said to Wei Gao: "Go and ask why it was blocked for so long?"

Wei Gao went to ask, and came back soon to report: "They said this is the rule of the internal guards. When the emperor travels, he must clear the place in advance, an hour or an hour and a half in advance. If the time is too short, it is not conducive to deployment and control, and the assassins will be killed." Find opportunities.”

Li Ye was speechless. The inner guards were performing their duties and could not be blamed. Although it took a little longer, they did not do it on purpose, but were just more cautious.

Because the inner city wall was unguarded, it was easy for assassins to lurk on it, so the inner guards needed to patrol the inner city wall after closing the passage, and most of the time was spent on this.

But it was too long to let the people wait for three hours.

Li Ye said to Wei Gao again: "Go and inform them that I have canceled my trip to Xingqing Palace, and ask them to cancel the closure of the gate!"

Li Ye took the carriage back to the palace gate, and his mood was really not good.

Li Ye had realized that the root of the inner guards' disturbance of the people was actually himself. The inner guards were the army, not the civilian government. If they did things with the thinking of the army, it would naturally cause public resentment.

The army required absolute obedience, strict compliance with orders, no appeals were allowed, and they had to execute even if they were wronged. If the people were wronged and wanted to appeal, if there was no way to appeal, they would naturally be angry and die of depression.

The inner guards are only responsible for themselves. They really don't need to consider the feelings of others. If they don't allow officials to solicit prostitution, the inner guards will follow their orders without hesitation and will not consider the feelings of officials at all.

Arrest people when they are suspicious without considering any evidence. If they find that they have arrested the wrong person, they will release him. They will not consider the pain of the arrested person, let alone the property loss of the arrested person.

This is actually the characteristic of military control. It only needs to facilitate the management of the army and will never consider the interests and feelings of the people.

But it is impossible to abolish the inner guards. Li Ye needs the inner guards to consolidate his rule. He abolished the eunuch system, so organizations like Jinyiwei are needed.

The key is the system and implementation. For example, I have told Li Chenghua more than once that we should arrest the big and let the small go, but in the end it was obviously not implemented in place. Even disputes between ordinary people have to be interfered, which is criticized.

Another problem is that the inner guard has too many soldiers. They are in charge of too many things, so the organization will be huge and the army will expand. Too many soldiers will be mixed. Some soldiers want to use the power of the inner guard for personal gain, which will cause some inner guard soldiers to extort Chang'an shops, leading to public resentment.

The inner guard has reached the point where it must be reformed. First of all, it must be reduced in size. 40,000 people are indeed too many. It is almost the same to reduce it to 10,000 people. The inner guard is not about the number of people, but about the elite.

The second is the institutional constraints. What can the inner guard do and what can't the inner guard do?

Li Ye thought of the White Tiger Hall, which is his own original system, which clarifies the division of authority from the source.

An institution similar to the White Tiger Hall can be set up for the inner guard. In fact, the inner guard also has the position of judge, but the judge is not independent and is subject to the chief officer. Secondly, the judge is a post-judgment, which is not very meaningful.

If there is such a faucet-like organization, then the inner guards must follow the rules no matter what they do. For example, if they want to go out, the notice will first be sent to the inner guard Baihu Hall, and the Baihu Hall will clearly state that the city gates will be closed for a quarter of an hour, and the generals will not be allowed to close the gates at will. If the generals extend the closing time without authorization, it will be a violation and they will be punished. If they are punished three times, they will be demoted.

For example, if someone comes to complain that a certain store sells fake medicine, the Baihu Hall will first receive the complaint, and it will judge that the procedure is wrong and refute it. The inner guards will not file a case.

Because the inner guards are connected to other government offices, the government offices cannot do big things, and they come to the inner guards for help. Only then can the inner guards take action, which is in line with the principle of catching the big and letting the small go.

Secondly, if the inner guards have not received the dispatch order from the Baihu Hall, they cannot make the decision to go out to enforce the law. The same is true for the soldiers. They cannot go to the streets to check people at will.

Thinking of this, Li Ye made a reply on Yan Zhenqing's memorial, "The inner guards should not be abolished, but reforms can be made! '