People who have watched "Yongzheng Dynasty" must know such a plot, that is, the unjust case of the Criminal Department, saying that Ren Ji'an killed someone and let Zhang Wuge top the bag. When he was finally about to be beheaded, Zhang Wuge's sister found the old thirteenth Yinxiang and, through the Kangxi Emperor, robbed the court and saved people, thus opening up the drama of the unjust case of the Criminal Department.
Many people think that this plot is unbelievable, where are such stupid people, not their own sins, why admit it?
This is really not a joke, because in real history, such incidents have emerged in an endless stream, especially in the middle and late Qing Dynasty.
This behavior also has a name, it is called "slaughtering white ducks"! This kind of unjust case is indeed a very representative ugly custom of the Qing Dynasty, and many people may not quite understand what is "slaughtering a white duck", so I will introduce it to you below:
This "slaughter of white ducks" does not refer to the killing of ducks, but refers to the rich and powerful landlords and gentry at that time, and after someone in the family had committed the great sin of killing their heads, they used heavy money to buy the living people in poor families to replace the real guilty people and kill their heads. Chen Qiyuan, a local official of the Qing Dynasty, once wrote a book called "Notes on Yong Xian zhai", which recorded:
"In the two provinces of Zhangzhou and Quan in Fujian Province, there are very many cases of murder, and the rich families kill people, give more money to the poor, and replace them with death, although there are honest officials, the rate is covered by them, and the so-called 'slaughter of white ducks' is also."
Not only that, but large families who pay a lot of money sometimes not only buy off poor families, but also do some arraignment of officials who are in this lawsuit. Many corrupt officials and rich families collude with each other, and even if the conscientious parents and officials want to overturn the case, they have no way to start because of "solid evidence."
As Chen Qiyuan recorded, such cases as "slaughtering white ducks" first appeared during the Qianlong period, and were especially common in Fujian, Quanzhou, Chaozhou, Huizhou and other coastal areas. However, the scale was still small and did not attract official attention, and by the Time of Daoguang, guangxi, Jiangxi, Zhejiang, Hunan and other regions began to frequently see similar cases of "slaughtering white ducks". According to the statistics of the "Qing Shilu", there are more than a hundred cases concluded every year in this area of Fujian because of the death of the top bag, which is implemented on the copywriting, and how many cases are not recorded.
In ancient times, the use of money to buy life was real, and the Daoguang Emperor was furious at this phenomenon, and immediately issued an order to local officials to strictly prohibit such illegal behavior. However, this kind of thing cannot be put an end to by talking about it, first of all, some officials who handle cases are faint and do not have the conviction to pursue it to the end, and when they receive benefits, they will give people things to do things. Secondly, the "prisoner" who came up to the top bag had memorized the confession before coming, and he himself admitted that he had killed people, and he also signed the pledge, who can stop this thing looking for death?
To use a sentence in "I am not a medicine god", there is only one disease in this world that cannot be cured, that is, the disease of poverty! Yes, this kind of slaughtered white duck is often poor and ill, and it is not cured.
A Qing Dynasty official named Chen Ao once cracked an unjust, false and wrong case of "slaughtering a white duck", and after the murderer killed someone, he asked a thin child with yellow face and thin muscles to come to the law. Chen Ao immediately judged that this was a top bag case, although the teenager described his murder process in great detail. However, under the enlightenment of Chen Ao, the teenager finally did not give up the hope of life and admitted that he had been wronged, so Chen Ao beat the case back to the subordinate county and asked for it to be reiterated.
But what people never expected was that after a few days, the teenager was sent back again, or admitted that he was guilty, Chen Ao was puzzled, and every attempt to persuade him was fruitless. In the end, the case could only be concluded by executing the teenager, and Chen Ao could not let go of his feelings, so he asked the teenager why he did not overturn the case before the execution, and the teenager cried and said:
"Extremely grateful for the grace of the net, after sending it back, the county official was even more tortured and could not ask for death; the parents came to scold: 'The money for selling Er has been exhausted, and Er Nai has retracted his confession to harm his parents?' If you get out of prison, you will be executed! I thought about going in and out of death, rather than obeying my parents and dying. ”
Chen Ao's words made Chen Ao's heart discouraged, and it can be seen that the phenomenon of "slaughtering white ducks" can no longer be solved by a few official orders, so as we asked at the beginning, why did such a contemptuous thing as "slaughtering white ducks" happen?
First of all, it has to be admitted that the legal system in ancient times was not perfect, and it is believed that similar incidents occurred not only in the Qing Dynasty but also in several dynasties. At that time, information exchange was not developed, each case could not be transparently and openly displayed in front of the public, there was no media and no public opinion pressure, so many rich children were fighting for their own family property, and it was inevitable to exploit the loopholes in the law.
Secondly, some local governments of the Qing Dynasty were not benevolent to officials, and it was precisely because the Emperor of Tiangao was far away that the emperor could not personally approve every case, and the local officials held the power of life and death. Those who have a darker heart and receive money do things, and they do not care whether they are unjust, false or wrongly decided; although lazy and lazy government officials do not collect money or collude with local gentry, in line with the principle that more is better than less, the confession is directly judged; a small number of officials with a sense of responsibility, such as Chen Ao, cannot change the current situation of the prevalence of "slaughtering white ducks" even if they overturn the case.
Finally, the life of the people at the bottom of the Qing Dynasty was unimaginably poor, and they were willing to sell their own flesh and blood or the lives of relatives and friends for money, and staged a "good play" of Zhou Yu beating Huang Gai, which was also the most important reason. Grassroots magistrates did not bother to ask questions, poor families were ignorant and ignorant, and what was even more sad was that the people were still accustomed to this, and such a social atmosphere created the soil for the breeding of the bad habit of "slaughtering white ducks".
Old Mr. February River seems to like to disclose the bad habit of the Qing Dynasty, not only in the "Yongzheng Dynasty" there is a case of injustice by the Punishment Department. In the novel "The Kangxi Emperor", there is also a story of "slaughtering white ducks", which tells the story of the Kangxi Emperor who ordered the execution of a bully who raped a girl. On the day of the execution, the Kangxi Emperor happened to be drinking tea nearby, and it turned out that it was not the same person at all, and as a result, The shopkeeper advised him:
"Long live Grandpa does not know, now, there is a first-class big household, broke the law, and does not want to die, just spend money to buy a stand-in ... This is called slaughtering white ducks. Anyone who is a white duck is either too poor to work, or there is a big incident in the family, and they are anxious to use the money, so they have to exchange their lives for it. ”
In the last years of the Qing Dynasty, there was also a case of "slaughtering white ducks", called the Wang Shuwen case:
It was also an imposter crime, but Wang Shuwen did not know that he would be sentenced to death, and as a result, on the day of the execution, the mule pulling the cart was frightened and ran to the City God Temple. Tu Zongying, the inspector of Henan who supervised the case, was alarmed, and he felt that things were very strange:
First, this Wang Shuwen was only fifteen years old, too thin and too small to kill people; second, this case was a case that he had supervised, and the people at the bottom dared to engage in favoritism and fraud, and really did not put themselves in their eyes; third, they were going to be beheaded, but a group of messengers could not hold a mule, and it was like divine help in the darkness, which was providence and could not be killed.
The road to the retrial was also tortuous, in short, Cixi "Lafayette" finally ordered the release of Wang Shuwen, many officials who favoritism and fraud were not prosecuted, while the real murderers were at large, but Zhu Guangdi, the governor of Dengzhou who petitioned for the people:
"Poor can not return, but died in Yu."
The Qing Dynasty was so corrupt that it would be strange not to die!