In the chaotic period of the Three Kingdoms, there were many talented people, but many of them did not have good virtue, and it is reasonable to say that if you want to become a qualified official, you should have both ability and political integrity, but in such a chaotic world, all the forces in order to win victory are generally thirsty for talents, so they are "meritocracy", so Cao Cao issued the "Order for Meritocracy", announcing that only if there is talent, he will be entrusted with a heavy responsibility.
This is the requirement of a special period, in the era of peace, when talents are born, the ruler will change the concept of meritocracy, he will also demand that there must be virtue, only those who are able to do it will be admitted, but in fact, in the feudal society, the power of the environment, can remain incorruptible in the face of fame and fortune and out of the mud without staining, almost every failed dynasty, one of the reasons for the demise is the corruption of officials.
Most of the emperors were born by the royal family, from childhood to stay in the palace of abundant food and clothing, do not know the people's livelihood, can only be through the official presented to the fold to see the situation, but many times the officials will collude, and did not tell the real situation to the emperor, so many emperors will arrange eyeliner in the folk to understand the situation.
Zhu Yuanzhang, who was born in cloth clothes, he was well aware of the darkness and danger of the officialdom, so since he took the throne, he has been committed to rectifying the corrupt atmosphere of officials, as long as he finds corrupt officials, he will not let go, and also formulated a special corresponding policy for this, during the governance period he killed a total of 50,000 corrupt officials, but even if he devoted his life to this, in the end he still could not solve this problem, but the later Yongzheng Emperor only used three tricks, but got good results.
Zhu Yuanzhang, the founding emperor of the Ming Dynasty, was born in a family of cloth clothes, and his ancestors had been exploited by imperial court officials, so he was well aware of the sufferings of the people and deeply resented the political chaos of officials at the end of the Yuan Dynasty, so as soon as he ascended to the throne, he began to change this kind of customs throughout the ages.
In order to make officials no longer embezzlement, he made a very strict decision, not only to treat corruption as an act that violates the criminal law, but also to punish as long as the greed is sixty-two, and sometimes Zhu Yuanzhang will have the upper hand in his personal emotions, not in accordance with the criminal law he set, but directly sentenced to death, he also hopes to use this method to deter other officials and let them know the consequences of corruption.
Zhu Yuanzhang's anti-corruption decisions made during his reign have been very strict, he is not afraid of touching the interests of the aristocratic class, this kind of strong punishment measures have indeed played a deterrent effect, he has killed a total of 50,000 corrupt officials in the 31 years of his reign, but even so, the emergence of corrupt officials or former servants and successors has made him very distressed.
However, Zhu Yuanzhang dealt with things that had not been solved well for so long, but the Yongzheng Emperor achieved good results, he was also an emperor full of ambition and hard work, before him was the Kangxi Emperor, at the beginning Kangxi also had great achievements, but after getting old, he was tired, resulting in more and more corrupt officials, and when the state was handed over to Yongzheng, there were only eight million silver in the treasury.
Therefore, after the Yongzheng Emperor ascended the throne, he adopted a strict policy, he rewarded officials with honest and accomplished styles, and also punished corrupt officials who fished in muddy waters. The first point is that corrupt officials are found to need to sit in their families.
He believes that corrupt officials cannot be spared, and that he cannot be punished alone, but must be punished with the whole family, because he cannot accomplish such a thing as an official's corruption alone, and his relatives know at least a little bit, and may even be accomplices, so they must be punished together.
The second point is to do the process of raiding the family, because some officials are not afraid of death, he embezzled in order to leave more money for his family and descendants, so he had to break his thoughts, so once he found that the situation was serious, he would raid the house, so that many officials would be afraid of embezzlement at home, and the wealth from the family would also enrich the national treasury, killing two birds with one stone.
The last point is to let all officials see the execution scene and play a deterrent role, that is, to "kill the chicken and scare the monkey". These harsh and ruthless practices of the Yongzheng Emperor effectively improved the corruption of officials and enriched the state treasury, which can be said to reverse the situation left by the Kangxi Emperor.