Since the withdrawal of the Edo shogunate from the stage of history, the question of Emperor Meiji's thinking has become how to make Japan strong and the consolidation of imperial power; how to make Japan strong, that is the business of the ministers, he only needs to do his full support; but how to consolidate imperial power is for him to really do it. Although the Edo shogunate no longer existed, the power of the local clan kings was still very strong, and it was certainly not possible to withdraw the domain directly.
After the shogunate's resistance was completely eliminated, the Meiji Emperor began to implement the policy of "returning the version", which was probably to let the major names return their territories (i.e., territory) and subjects (i.e., household registration) to the emperor, and because of the four strong clans of Satsuma, Choshu, Tosa, and Hizen, the implementation of the "Bong return version" was carried out smoothly.
After that, Emperor Meiji continued to issue various decrees to weaken local daimyōs, until the "abolition of the domain and the establishment of prefectures", the Meiji Emperor was basically centralized, but how did the Meiji Emperor "fool" those local daimyo? One aspect of one's own strength and fame was one thing, and satisfying the vanity of the daimyo was also an extremely crucial step, so Emperor Meiji specially introduced the concept of "Chinese".
In fact, the so-called "Chinese" is similar to the aristocratic system in Western countries, and is also divided into five titles: gong, hou, uncle, son, and male; there are two ways to become a "Chinese", the first is the old nobles before, and the second is the people with great achievements; the biggest advantage of this is to let this group of people form a firm supporter of maintaining their rule, and this is indeed the case.
In the "Chinese" system, the highest rank is naturally the duke, and the dukes enjoy much higher welfare than the marquis, but at the same time they are extremely rare, and at most there are only 19 dukes; at the time of the "Chinese" system, only 11 dukes were made dukes, and in addition to the old Goji family (Ichijo, Nijō, Kujo, Konoe, and Takashi), there were also Tokugawa Ieta, Mitsujō Shimi, Iwakura Kushi, Mori Mototoku, Shimazu Tadao, and Shimazu Hisamitsu.
The Old Goto family is the oldest and most prominent top nobleman in Japan, although the real power is no longer there, but the historical precipitation and influence cannot be ignored, no matter what the purpose, these five families must be provided with the highest standards. Although the Edo shogunate fell, the Tokugawa family's influence remained great, and for reasons of respect and other reasons, the Tokugawa clan had to be a duke; later Tokugawa Keiki was also made a duke, but this was a later matter.
Iwakura was regarded as the core figure of the fallen curtain in the court, Andra Shimi was the guide of the imperial court symbolizing the fallen curtain restoration, and the duke had no problem. Mori Mototoku was the lord of the Choshu Domain, and the Choshu Domain was the main force in the Fall of the Curtain Movement; Shimazu Tadayoshi was the lord of the Satsuma Domain, and the Satsuma Domain was also the main force in the Fall of the Curtain Movement; and the key was that the Choshu Domain and the Satsuma Domain were not only rich and strong, but also Mori Mototoku and Shimazu Tadaoyoshi were also very supportive of the Fall, probably to avenge their ancestors.
But it is doubtful why there were two dukes in the Shimazu family, this Shimazu Hisamitsu was the biological father of Shimazu Tadaoyoshi, but Shimazu Hisamitsu failed in a battle for the position of governor with his half-brother Shimazu Chibin; this Shimazu Kibin was known as one of the "Four Wise Lords of the Shogunate", and it was under his rule that satsuma domain was so open and virtuous and powerful; but Shimazu Kibi had no heirs, so he was succeeded by Shimazu Tadaoyoshi, the son of Shimazu Kumitsu.
However, due to the young age of Shimazu Tadaoyoshi, Shimazu Hisamitsu held real power as the father of the country, and as for Shimazu Tadaoyoshi, although he liked foreign affairs, he did nothing all day; it can be said that satsuma domain became the main force of the curtain fall movement, which was completely controlled by his father Shimazu Hisamitsu. Therefore, when it came to the selection of the dukes, Emperor Meiji also struggled for a long time, after all, although Shimazu Tadaoyoshi had no merit, he was the governor of the Shimazu family after all, and Shimazu Hisamitsu, although not the governor of the house, was the actual controller of the Satsuma Domain.
In the end, Emperor Meiji decided to be generous and made both Shimazu Hisamitsu and Shimazu Tadayoshi dukes, and as a result, the Shimazu family had two dukes, an honor that made other families envious, even the Tokugawa family, who only had two dukes after Tokugawa Keiki was later made dukes.
Of course, although becoming a duke seems to have a lot of welfare benefits on the surface, such as priority in education, but in fact it was very miserable; because Japan was still very poor at that time, so the number of these "Chinese" was not high, even if the duke was only more than 60,000 yen, which was not enough for them to maintain the life of the rich family; and the Meiji Emperor was also a very "chicken thief", often held events, invited these "Chinese" to participate, which was also a big expense.
This is a heavy burden for the Chinese people, so that some of the nobles of the secretaries of state have to sell their property in order to maintain their dignity, which is really miserable; but this is not a big deal for the daimyo Chinese, why? Because the Daimyo-Hwa clan received one-tenth of the income of the skill as a fenglu after the restoration; the Choshu clan had 369,000 stones, and the Satsuma clan was as high as 770,000 stones, even if only one-tenth of the income was a fenglu, it was very much.
Moreover, these daimyo Chinese also set up Chinese banks and made various investments, they had information channels, they had policy support, so they were getting richer and richer, and they were the richest class at that time; although they often needed to help the old courtiers, they would not help in the case of affecting their lives, so they still lived a very elegant life.