The Ming Dynasty was the last Han regime in China's feudal history, the embryo of capitalism appeared economically, the culture was most famous for novels representing the civic class, three of the four famous books were from this period, military diplomacy was also a relatively tough dynasty, and there were diplomatic events like Zheng He's voyage to the West. Politically, the abolition of the chancellor's monopoly of power, the peak of centralized power, and the successive emperors of the Ming Dynasty firmly grasped the power in their own hands, which gave rise to a unique system of the Ming Dynasty - the factory guard system.
The factory guard system is the East Factory West Factory Jinyi Guard, the Jinyi Guard Surveillance Minister, the East Factory Monitoring the Jinyi Guard, the West Factory Monitoring the East Factory, the layers of surveillance, greatly strengthening the imperial power, ensuring that the whole country is in the hands of the emperor, this system is really effective in reducing the corruption or inaction of the ministers, but after a long period of development, the power given to the factory guards is too large, and it is precisely the factory guards who are corrupt, and some scholars believe that the demise of the Ming Dynasty was not due to the exiles, but to the factory guards.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="23" > predecessor of the factory guard, the honor guard of the three services</h1>
1. The predecessor of Jinyiwei is the security personnel
As we all know, Ming Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang was born in a humble background, once worked as a beggar, a peasant, a monk, etc., after the establishment of the regime, in order to highlight the majesty of the emperor, set up the Arch Guard Division, YiLuan Division, this is the predecessor of the Jinyi Guard, what these two departments do, in fact, the Arch Guard Division is responsible for organizing the honor guard when the emperor goes out on a parade, responsible for the clothing, etiquette, and arrangement of large-scale activities at the national level.
The Ming Dynasty was established only after defeating the Yuan Dynasty established by the Mongols, and Zhu Yuanzhang, in order to emphasize the orthodox Chinese status of the Ming Dynasty, placed special emphasis on etiquette, and the investment in the Gongwei Division was also very large, so that his dynasty had a lot of face.
Like the current state leaders, there must be a special army to protect the emperor's safety, Zhu Yuanzhang in order to ensure safety, select some tall, martial arts strong people to form a security force, in peacetime responsible for domestication of the royal horse elephant and other tasks used in travel, the department name Yi Luansi, because it is the emperor's personal bodyguard, so the relationship is naturally close, becoming the emperor's most reliant unit in the deep palace. Because the two departments often have to work together, in order to improve office efficiency, the two departments were simply merged into one department, and Jinyiwei was born.
2. The imperial power is constantly strengthened, and the supervision is continuously strengthened
In order to suppress the people and supervise the corruption and inaction of Ming officials, Jinyiwei had the function of investigating and judging, and during the Ming Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang period, he made many merits for the emperor, of course, some of which were also credited by torture, and for a time Jinyiwei became the most favored troop around the emperor, but due to the excessive power of Jinyiwei, there were also many favoritism and fraud during the period, so Hongwu was banned for twenty-six years.
However, after the Battle of Jingnan, many ministers were very dissatisfied with the orthodoxy of Zhu Di of Ming Chengzu, and rumors spread among the people, so Zhu Di re-activated the Jinyi guard system, suppressed the ministers, and added the East Factory (東縣事廠), which was directly subordinate to the emperor, could arbitrarily arrest subjects without judicial approval, and had the right to monitor Jinyi Wei, and the right to monitor Jinyi Wei was even greater.
In the twelfth year of Chenghua, many mysterious events occurred in the palace, the fox demon night out, Li Zilong Jun, etc. made the Chenghua Emperor Zhu See have a deep heart palpitation, so in order to understand the movements of the courtiers outside the palace, he selected people from the Jinyi guards disguised as civilians to investigate outside to prevent the occurrence of the matter of killing the king again, so the West Factory was born, and had the right to choose his own subordinates, due to the strong support of the Chenghua Emperor, and a large number of backbone forces were selected from the Jinyi Guards, and the West Factory expanded rapidly, and the power surpassed the East Factory.
During the reign of Emperor Mingwuzong Zhengde, the contradictions between the east and west factories became increasingly strong, and another inner factory was set up, which had greater rights than the west factory and the east factory, not only supervising the subjects, but also supervising the jinyi guards of the east and west factories, and the imperial power was further strengthened.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="33" > embroidered spring knife and the spring of the governor</h1>
Kings of all dynasties have the habit of killing meritorious servants or abolishing the privileges of meritorious men, such as Liu Bang, Zhao Kuangyin, Zhu Yuanzhang, etc., and some ministers really can't find evidence of the crime, and it is not easy to directly install the crime, the Zhu Dynasty thought of handing over this dirty work to the factory guards, giving them the right to override the criminal law, doing some things for the emperor that he wanted to do but did not want to do with his own hands, and the factory guards became the organization that knew the most secrets around the emperor, and it was also the most favored organization around the emperor at that time, and the power was also increasing day by day.
1. The Jinyi Guard is frightening
In order to meet the needs of Zhu Yuanzhang to strengthen the centralization of power and slaughter heroes, Jinyiwei had the function of secret agent, directly responsible to the emperor, had the right to monitor arrests and interrogations, and through the System of Jinyiwei, greatly expanded the prison. The punishment in the prison was extremely cruel, with all means such as stick clamping, skinning, and Ling Chi, and basically there was no living person when he went in, so the emperor wanted to be tried for any crime and confessed easily, so Zhu Yuanzhang trusted Jinyiwei extremely much.
Relying on the emperor's favor, the power of the Jinyi guard expanded rapidly, and later in the Zhu Di era, the Battle of Jingnan, and the Northern Expedition to Mongolia, he made many achievements, in addition to suppressing peasant uprisings, supervising courtiers, and even participating in foreign affairs many times, catching spies, and gaining power. In film and television dramas, it is often seen that the waist embroidered spring knife is wearing a flying fish suit, which is the unique symbol of the Jinyi guard, and for a time the name of the Jinyi guard made the group of ministers feel frightened.
2. The father-in-law's spring has arrived
No emperor would allow an organization to grow wantonly, and would certainly find a way to contain such a team, so the emperor decided to let the close attendants around him be loyal to him. Because the Jinyi guards are not easy to control outside all the year round, the eunuchs are a good group to control, using eunuchs to monitor the Jinyi guards and not let the Jinyiwei family become dominant is undoubtedly the best way, and the East Factory also lives up to expectations, and the power is higher than the Jinyi guards to make the Jinyi guards really converge a lot.
Moreover, in the dispute between the friends and the party, Dongchang's suppression of the Donglin Party won the emperor's heart, and the status of the Dongchang replaced and surpassed that of Jinyiwei, and there were even eunuchs like Wei Zhongxian, who installed their confidants in the cabinet, the six ministries, and the governors of the provinces when suppressing the Donglin Party, and also extended their hands to the army to cultivate their own eunuch troops, and the power was tilted to the opposition. The spring that belonged to the eunuchs had finally arrived.
The emergence of the Inner Factory West Factory also strengthened the ranks of factory guards, only to limit the rights of the East Factory and the Jinyi Guards, and to supervise at all levels, but the power was too large to attract the opposition of the people, for various reasons, it did not exist for a long time, and did not set off a big storm, but the rights given to the eunuchs of the Internal Gong were unprecedented.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="42" > the Ming Dynasty died at the factory guard</h1>
When it comes to the collapse of the Ming Dynasty, there are many reasons, the natural disasters and man-made disasters caused by the abnormal climate during the Xiaoice River period are the most serious in the history of China's feudal society, and the resulting famine, war, plague, exile, and wu Sangui's rebellion at a critical time are all important reasons for the collapse of the Once-flourishing Ming Dynasty. However, in addition to external reasons, many scholars believe that the factory health system is also one of the main reasons for the collapse of the dynasty.
1. The deformed supervision makes the ministers look at each other and the people fall into panic
There should be an interdependent relationship between the monarch and the chancellor, the water can carry the boat and the boat, the good use of the minister is the stability of the dynasty, the King of Zhou Wu makes good use of Jiang Ziya to establish the Zhou Dynasty for eight hundred years, the Duke of Qi Huan makes good use of Guan Zhong to achieve the State of Qi to become the overlord of the Spring and Autumn Period, Li Shimin makes good use of Wei Zheng to create the rule of Zhenguan, and so on.
The establishment of the Factory Guard system in the Ming Dynasty was an extreme distrust of the ministers, and evolved into a deformed supervision, becoming a negative teaching material, the normal hundred officials system was oppressed, the correct advice could not reach the heavens for fear of offending the monarch, not only that, the common people were not spared under this factory guard system, it is said that a hundred people at home drunkenly gaffed and insulted the leader of the East Factory was tortured to death in prison, as soon as the incident came out, the people and the low-level scholars were in a panic, and the people's hearts were lost in the long run.
2. Huge expenses and corruption are rife
At the beginning of the establishment of the factory guard, it was set as a special investigation organization, well dressed and used, the scale of the beginning was not large, it was acceptable, with the expansion of the scale of the factory guard, the number of people increased, and the expenditure for the factory guard was a huge expense; the huge right made the factory guard from supervising corruption to the factory guard into the largest corrupt organization. The ministers who wanted to mix well did not give advice but turned to the eunuchs, and the trend of corruption was prevalent, spending money from the national treasury on the top, buying and selling officials below, and collecting the "protection fees" of various courtiers, so that the Ming Dynasty, which was not rich at all, made it worse, and the money went into the pockets of the factory guards, and the deficit in the national treasury was filled by the plundering of the people's fat and the people's paste, and over time, the people's resentment was everywhere.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="49" > eunuchs in power, politics are unclear</h1>
As we all know, it is impossible to be a eunuch without losing a little bit, and the physical disability makes the psychology more and more perverted, such a person grasps the government of the dynasty is usually a precursor to the fall of the country, Zhao Gao is in power and Qin II died, and the ten common things caused chaos in the world during the Eastern Han Dynasty. The scale of the factory guards became larger and larger, and in the late Ming Dynasty, Wei Zhongxian became the highest official of the factory guard system, holding the power of life and death, coupled with a large amount of wealth, the expansion of power made Wei Zhongxian an aerial emperor in the later period, "holding the princes of heaven and ordering the princes", so that the state government was controlled by eunuchs, wantonly slaughtering ministers, loyal ministers were killed, the emperor was overthrown, the government was controlled, the elite troops were held, and the obedient and rebellious people died. Loyal ministers will be killed, no one will be available in times of national crisis, the program will be chaotic, the politics will be unclear, and the people's hearts will be lost. The subjugation of the country is inevitable.
A benign system of supervision is necessary, and effective supervision can make the officials more diligent and reduce the corruption and inaction of ministers, but an excessive system of supervision will lead the country to a pathological development. The original intention of the factory health system was advanced, but the excessive development caused the Ming Dynasty to die in the factory health system and not just because of the rogues.
bibliography:
Cabinet Internal Supervision and Absolute Monarchy in the Ming Dynasty