How to effectively select high-quality talents from the grass-roots level has always been a major problem that has plagued successive generations of feudal rulers, and if this problem is not handled well, it will not only affect the administrative efficiency of the ruling organs, but also seriously undermine the ruling foundation of the authorities. In order to solve this problem, the Inspection system of the Han Dynasty required local governors to "raise the meritocracy and the right side to speak out", and later the Nine Pin Officials of the Wei and Jin Dynasties divided the other party into nine levels according to their family origin, character ability, and local public opinion.
However, these official selection systems were eventually controlled by the family clan, and as a result, there was no cold door in the upper grade and no power in the lower grade, forming a serious class solidification. The legitimate upward channels of the people at the bottom of the society were completely blocked, and they were forced to turn to the Hu regime, and with the surrender of a large number of Han people, the strength of the northern nomads grew rapidly, which was also a reason for the chaos in the Jin Dynasty.
How to firmly control the right to select talents in the hands of the supreme ruler and ensure that the upward path of the people of all social strata is not blocked? The rulers of the Sui and Tang dynasties did a great feat, that is, the imperial examination system!
People no longer need to rely on the recommendation of the local governor, and can throw themselves into the "Dynasty for Tian Shelang, Twilight Heavenly Son Hall". The imperial examination system greatly maintained the stability of feudal dynasty rule and contributed to the historical peak of the Sui and Tang dynasties. Therefore, the ancient imperial examination did not pursue absolute fairness, but to consolidate the dynastic rule as much as possible.
Therefore, in the Ming Dynasty, there was such a strange scene, the northern students reported that the southern examinees colluded in invigilation and cheated, Zhu Yuanzhang said: The southerners do not admit anyone! That is, the famous North-South List case.
After the Jingkang Disaster in the Song Dynasty, China's economic center completely moved south, and after years of war and turmoil in the north, the level of economic education has seriously declined, and the level of students in the south is far higher than that of students in the north. Formally based on the difference in geographical level caused by this historical reason, this "bizarre" scene appeared in Hongwu's thirty-year Ding Ugly Branch Examination: among the fifty-one candidates who were finally admitted, all of them were southerners, and none of the northerners were northerners.
Zhu Yuanzhang is probably the emperor who hates corrupt officials the most in history, as long as the people at the bottom feel that they have grievances, they can directly beat the drum and sing the grievances, and even tie up local officials and send them to the capital to ask for guilt, and local officials at all levels must not obstruct! Based on this atmosphere of the people not being afraid of officials, the northern students who saw the list completely stopped doing it, and felt that it must involve favoritism and fraud, and the invigilator was Liu Sanwu, a southerner, so he favored the southerners. The northern examinees jointly went to the Ming Dynasty to file a complaint of injustice.
Zhu Yuanzhang was shocked when he learned of this, and immediately ordered more than a dozen central officials to investigate and re-read the file. As a result, after re-reading the papers, these dozen officials concluded that there was no favoritism or fraud in this examination, and that the southern examinees were brilliant in their literary ability and were admitted by relying on their real talents and practical studies.
For this review result, the northern examinees refused to accept it no matter what, and the officials of the northern nationality also began to speak out, saying that the chief examiner deliberately submitted the inferior examination papers of the northern examinees during the re-examination, which led to this result. Zhu Yuanzhang was furious and directly sent the chief examiner Liu Sanwu and others to the northwest, and Zhang Xin in the second verification team was directly executed, and most of the rest were also assigned.
Zhu Yuanzhang simply read the paper himself and asked questions, and admitted sixty-one candidates, and it is interesting that in the list of this admission, there was not a single southern candidate, which is the beginning and end of the North and South List incidents.
As the founding emperor of the Ming Dynasty, did Zhu Yuanzhang not even know the difference in the level of development between the north and the south? Obviously impossible. Zhu Yuanzhang hoped that these reviewing officials would be able to screen out the examination papers of some northern students and achieve a balance between the north and the south. As a result, these officials still wrote the names of a bunch of southern students, which angered Zhu Yuanzhang. Only two officials involved in the review were not convicted because they drew up a list of northern students.
If in the unified examination of the country, the number of students admitted to the north is very small to almost none, it means that there will be more and more southern officials in the DPRK in the future. First, it caused dissatisfaction among the northerners and shook the foundation of the Ming Dynasty's northern rule. Second, there are more and more officials in the south, and they are bound to form parties for personal gain and threaten the imperial power. Zhu Yuanzhang must artificially adjust the balance of power between the north and the south through the scale of the imperial examination, stabilize the rule of the Ming Dynasty, and not a single southern student is recorded, which is undoubtedly releasing this signal.
Since then, the imperial examination has no longer been a national unified standard, but has been replaced by a separate north-south examination, that is, the candidates from the north and south are first ranked in the examination in their local area, and then the gongsheng is selected, and then the temple style is unified.