Rebellion is a particularly low-skill endeavor—for any穿越者, as long as one has thoroughly read and roughly mastered the Five Scrolls of Dragon Slaying Secrets, coupled with the Compendium of Backyard Alchemy, the Companion for Military and Civilian Talents, and a few other difficult-to-obtain books, rebellion becomes quite easy.
This is because the content of the aforementioned books includes, but is not limited to, how to raise a team, how to train an army, how to develop industry, how to develop public health and medicine, and other miscellaneous matters. Applying them to any ancient dynasty is equivalent to a dimensional strike.
However, rebellion is easy, and establishing a country is easy, but it does not mean governing the world is equally easy.
Theories such as separation of powers, checks and balances between civil and military officials, and the stable interplay of public power, private power, and imperial power are easy to talk about, but often prove much more difficult in practice.
For instance, just as Zhu Jinsong was attempting to consolidate some imperial power while strengthening certain public and private powers, the officials of the Great Ming provided him with a considerable surprise.
This matter harks back to the issue of abolishing clan power and strengthening household power.
For any ancient dynasty, clan power has always been a troublesome issue, not only for emperors but also for the high officials in court.
However, the rather frustrating aspect is that while the high officials in court find clan power troublesome when serving, once they retire, they themselves become beneficiaries of clan power.
As someone once said, there are individuals who betray their class, but there is no class that betrays itself.
Therefore, the issue of clan power persists.
To resolve the problem of clan power, Zhu Jinsong had not tried to forcefully abolish the clan system and strengthen household power and individual private rights.
However, despite operations as fierce as a tiger, the feedback received was rather touching.
The clan system had indeed been abolished; after all, he was the founding emperor, and no one in the current Great Ming dared to openly oppose Zhu Jinsong. However, simultaneously with strengthening individual private rights and household power, the common people began to question the current Ming laws.
This matter must be traced back to certain suppressed small newspapers in Jiangnan.
Because Zhu Jinsong had been tirelessly promoting community schools and literacy programs for years, although the literacy rate in the Great Ming was still not particularly high, as the number of literate commoners increased, the demand for reading materials naturally surged.
Thus, various miscellaneous small newspapers naturally emerged.
Before the court could react, these miscellaneous small newspapers naturally had an opportunity for wild growth—commenting on national affairs in newspapers was considered mild; those with bolder spirits even dared to fabricate gossipy news from the imperial harem, and they did so with convincing detail and style.
In response to such miscellaneous small newspapers, local governments naturally did not hesitate to arrest people and seal off publications.
However, to put it another way, while the court could seal off one or two small newspapers, or even ten or eight, the demand for newspapers or reading materials from the populace was evident. Relying solely on sealing off small newspapers to solve the problem was not a long-term solution.
It was precisely for this reason that Zhu Jinsong pondered that instead of constantly resorting to sealing off small newspapers, it would be better to learn from the practices of certain government ministries and propaganda departments and bring newspapers directly under control.
For example, allowing private individuals to establish newspapers, but the person who established the newspaper would be responsible. If any inappropriate content appeared, the government would directly find the responsible party.
Concurrently, an approval process could be added before the newspaper's distribution, even if it were only a general review, to ensure that there were no major directional issues.
At this point, everything was still developing in a positive direction.
But soon, problems emerged.
What is the function of newspapers?
It is to guide public opinion and to supervise the effectiveness of the court's policies. Zhu Jinsong had never forbidden newspapers from commenting on the right and wrong of the court.
However, when it came to the implementation phase, a seemingly good initiative turned into a bad one.
The first problem arose with those newspapers that were permitted to publish—every single newspaper that reached Zhu Jinsong was filled with content lauding the court, with not a single piece of criticism or exposure of societal ills.
Zhu Jinsong instinctively felt something was wrong—even a certain respected leader was criticized at times. How could I, a programmer who transitioned into a web writer, be entirely faultless?
Furthermore, even if I were learning from Russia, Uncle Sam, and the Rabbit, avoiding all possible pitfalls, are there truly no flaws in the entire court of the Great Ming?
For instance, news about how much silver a certain official embezzled and was subsequently stripped and punished, or gossip about an official losing his position due to taking on more concubines—wouldn't these small newspapers report on them?
This is inherently abnormal.
Upon discovering that something was amiss, Zhu Jinsong's first reaction was that someone was again deceiving those above and below.
In response to this situation, Zhu Jinsong naturally did not hesitate to dispatch the Embroidered Uniform Guard, the Eastern Depot, and the Heaven and Earth Society.
The reports from the Embroidered Uniform Guard, the Eastern Depot, and the Heaven and Earth Society indeed confirmed that something was seriously wrong—the requirement sent from Zhu Jinsong and the Grand Secretariat was to supervise these small newspapers, while the requirements from the Ministry of Rites to the Provincial Administration Commissioners escalated to strengthening supervision. By the time it reached the prefectures and counties, it had transformed from supervision to strengthening supervision, and then to strengthening content control.
This approach completely stunned Zhu Jinsong.
This method felt very familiar.
It was truly an inversion of the norm!
Of course, this kind of inversion was not insurmountable. After all, the official hats of the local officials were still in the hands of the Ministry of Personnel. It was incredibly easy to remove those who were disobedient or disruptive.
Furthermore, even if those officials were not afraid of the Ministry of Personnel, they would likely fear the armed forces in Zhu Jinsong's hands.
Then, a topic began to circulate in these small newspapers—whether the Great Ming's current laws, which often involved collective punishment, the extermination of three generations, nine generations, the annihilation of entire families, and the confiscation of property, were reasonable or unreasonable.
Slowly, this topic shifted from certain small newspapers to the "Great Ming Daily News," where discussions about the reasonableness of such laws also began.
It was veering in another direction once again!
Although he had been mentally prepared, Zhu Jinsong still felt a headache when encountering situations that either went off-track or veered in a new direction.
To put it bluntly, even if one wanted to be subjected to the extermination of nine generations or the annihilation of a family, not just anyone was privileged enough to receive such treatment.
In essence, those who were likely to have their three or nine generations, or their entire families, exterminated or their property confiscated were generally not ordinary commoners; they at least needed to have a certain standing in society.
For example, officials.
Those ordinary commoners, even if they actively sought such perilous treatment, did not have the qualification!
Therefore, Zhu Jinsong could not understand why the commoners of the Great Ming were willing to echo such articles when officials and local gentry instigated certain literati to publish them.
This gave the impression of a miserable tenant farmer whose own child was crying from hunger, yet he took the two eggs he painstakingly retrieved from a chicken's backside and delivered them to the young master of the landlord's household!
Or, consider livestock fearing the butcher.
Although these livestock might have the opportunity to become butchers in the future, you haven't become butchers yet, have you?
Thus, Zhu Jinsong could not fathom the reason for this.
What bothered Zhu Jinsong was not just the various messy issues like numerous small newspapers and commoners considering the private interests of officials.
What troubled Zhu Jinsong even more was the path forward for the Great Ming.
The "Five Small Industries," this was not a difficult matter for Zhu Jinsong, or rather, it was not a difficult matter for the current Great Ming. But what about the future?
As the Great Ming occupied more territory, the scope of these "Five Small Industries" would expand. Once every county had its own complete set of "Five Small Industries," problems such as redundant construction would naturally arise.
Of course, problems like redundant construction were minor. The truly significant issue was that as the industrialization process progressed, the demand for workers from workshops also surged.
In fact, not only were numerous places experiencing a shortage of workers, but the Great Ming's court also had similar needs, especially the head of the Ministry of Works, Song Yucheng, who practically wished he could use one person as two.
According to Song Yucheng, construction sites in various regions were already treating women as men and men as beasts of burden, yet the demand for workers still remained in the millions, even tens of millions.
If one were to include the workshops of local governments and private enterprises, the Great Ming's demand for workers even reached a deficit of approximately thirty million.
Of course, solving the problem of surging demand for workers was not too difficult. For example, some commoners could be detached from agriculture and fully transition into workers, or labor could be introduced to fill the gap.
However, both of these methods had their advantages and disadvantages.
For example, introducing labor... forget it. Such an idea was merely for contemplation; its actual implementation was entirely impossible.
Laborers did not have Ming household registration and were not protected by Ming law. While they couldn't be called disposable consumables, they were essentially close to it, considered consumables that one wouldn't feel pained over or need to provide compensation for if they died.
Such laborers were generally employed in projects that required human lives to fill, such as quarrying and road construction, and they could never be allowed to work in normal workshops.
This was akin to the Chinese laborers who were promised to go to Uncle Sam's land to pan for gold but ended up being sold like pigs to build railways.
If Uncle Sam could do this, then Zhu Jinsong, the Emperor of the Great Ming, could certainly do the same.
There was also another method, such as allowing some commoners to detach from agriculture—setting aside whether the commoners were willing to detach from agriculture, even if they were willing to do so without any objection, would their income increase? If it increased, would it attract more commoners to also want to detach from agriculture?
If a large number of commoners chose to detach from agriculture, would the yield of grain still be guaranteed? How should the land that became idle as a result be handled? Should it continue to be distributed to other commoners? Or should it be reserved for those commoners who went to work in workshops? Or should it be used elsewhere?
If it were distributed to other commoners, those commoners working in workshops would likely not be willing.
If it were kept for them, would it be fair to the commoners who continued to farm?
As for using it elsewhere... this would be similar to distributing it to other commoners; those commoners working in workshops would certainly not be willing either.
In short, the current Great Ming was plagued by all sorts of miscellaneous problems, making Emperor Zhu Jinsong so frustrated that he wanted to kill people.
Yet, these problems could not be ignored, as they all related to the future of the entire Great Ming, far exceeding minor issues like the Japanese recruiting laborers in India.
Therefore, Zhu Jinsong was very vexed.
However, Zhu Jinsong had one advantage: he was skilled at shifting his troublesome problems onto others.
For example, when faced with all sorts of reverse inversions and deviations, Zhu Jinsong chose to dump the problems onto the Ministry of Rites, the Censorate, the Embroidered Uniform Guard, and the Office of the Comptroller-General.
The Ministry of Rites was to devise new regulations, the Censorate was to investigate, the Embroidered Uniform Guard was to apprehend, and the Office of the Comptroller-General was to question.
Furthermore, problems such as redundant construction of the "Five Small Industries" in various regions could also be left for the Grand Secretariat officials and the Minister of Works, Song Yucheng, to worry about.
Other issues, such as clan power, private power, and public power, could naturally be handed over to the Grand Secretariat and the Ministry of Justice officials to ponder.
In any case, these individuals all received their salaries from the court, and these issues were considered their responsibilities. If these officials could not solve the problems, Zhu Jinsong could also choose to replace them with individuals who could.
Only the issue of the labor shortage was impossible to solve by passing it to anyone.
Pass it to the Minister of Revenue, Liu Huaiwen?
As Liu Huaiwen stated: "Even if I were Guanyin, delivering a child to all married couples in the Great Ming, they would need over ten years to raise a child to adulthood."
The only thing the Ministry of Revenue could do was to have the household departments in various regions and the local agricultural associations post slogans in towns and villages, such as "How can life become prosperous? Have more children and plant more trees!" or "If you have children and cannot afford to raise them, the court will help you raise them!" to encourage the populace to have more children and plant more trees.
Beyond this, there were basically no other solutions.
In a nutshell, no one could solve this problem. If Your Majesty had a solution, you should figure it out yourself. We will obediently follow your instructions without any objections.
This made Zhu Jinsong very dissatisfied—if I had a solution, would I be trying to pass these problems onto you?