If there was any major event in the court recently, it must be that the Zuosi, the Shenguanyuan, the Libu, and the Sanbanyuan dismissed dozens of middle and low-level officials on the grounds of mediocrity.

But what is incredible is that this incident was investigated by Fan Zhongyan in a very high-profile manner, and the Imperial City Bureau fully cooperated.

Fan Zhongyan personally went to various government offices to supervise officials and severely punished those who were lazy and idle. Many officials were the top leaders in their departments, but they were not active at work and were lazy in handling government affairs. Fan Zhongyan found excuses to dismiss them.

This was clearly an act of exceeding one's authority, yet the Censorate remained silent. The two top officials of the Censorate, Chief Censor Yan Shu and Acting Chief Censor Jia Changchao, accompanied Fan Zhongyan throughout the entire process, helping him clear the way.

You have to know that these two are both members of the Lü Party, and many officials dismissed by Fan Zhongyan were also members of the Lü Party. Letting them support Fan Zhongyan is like undermining their own party.

Then many officials came to their senses.

As Fan Zhongyan was the mortal enemy of the Lu Party, Prime Minister Lu would never allow Fan Zhongyan to act so recklessly. Moreover, Fan Zhongyan himself did not have the power to dismiss officials. He did not even hold any powerful position in the Ministry of Personnel and was not qualified to do these things.

But he was able to do this, which can only mean one thing - there was another big boss supporting Fan Zhongyan.

Who?

Of course it is the current emperor.

Apart from that official, who else could mobilize the Imperial City Administration, and who dared to touch Prime Minister Lu?

But after figuring this out, the officials in Beijing became confused.

Two days ago, Fan Zhongyan impeached Lü Yijian and was demoted to the lowest position. At that time, everyone thought that Lü Yijian was in the emperor's favor. How come the court's attitude changed in just two days?

This is happening too fast.

Soon, some smart people understood the reason... His Majesty suppressed Fan Zhongyan on the surface, but in fact he still gave them both fifty lashes. He probably used this as an excuse to weaken the strength of Lu's party. Lu Yijian probably knew this, so he simply went with the flow and asked Yan Shu and Jia Changchao to cooperate fully.

For a moment, they all sighed in their hearts that His Majesty's imperial mind was truly unfathomable. Even though Lu Yijian had won the emperor's favor so deeply and accompanied His Majesty through all the hardships, he was ultimately unable to escape the fate of reckoning, and his later years were somewhat bleak.

Fortunately, although the Lü Party suffered a significant blow, its strength and foundation were intact. Because most of the Lü Party's senior officials were not punished, the top power was preserved, and Prime Minister Lü was not isolated and helpless in the court. Therefore, this result was not unacceptable to him.

The only difference was that the opinions of the court and the people regarding the relationship between Lü Yijian and Fan Zhongyan quickly changed. Officials who had previously been trying to curry favor with Lü Yijian and had written letters to impeach Fan Zhongyan suddenly changed their tune and began writing letters to praise Fan Zhongyan.

Court officials have always been like this, without any stance.

They will help whoever wins.

On May 3rd, the third year of the Jingyou reign, Fan Zhongyan, after a busy day, got into a sedan chair. In the early Northern Song Dynasty, officials still mainly rode horses or carriages. However, sedan chairs became popular in the middle period. Because the Northern Song Dynasty was short of horses but had abundant human resources, hiring sedan chair bearers was obviously more cost-effective.

At this moment, the sedan chair was leaving from the Liang Gate of the inner city. It was still afternoon, and the streets were bustling with people. All kinds of vehicles were going in and out of the wide road. Outside the shops, umbrellas were opened and signs were hung. Voices of various accents from all directions could be heard throughout the market.

Fan Zhongyan sat in the sedan chair with his eyes closed to rest.

The Song Dynasty implemented a policy of high salaries to maintain integrity, and the monthly salaries of officials were extremely exaggerated. An ordinary official of the sixth or seventh rank had several official titles, including a stipend official, a casual official, a meritorious official, a post-official, and a dispatched official. The salary, allowances, and subsidies added up in one month could equal the income of an ordinary family for a year or even several years.

In addition, officials in the Song Dynasty also basically did business legally and owned a large number of shops and land.

Therefore, there were indeed few high-level corrupt officials in the Song Dynasty. After all, if converted to later generations, if you have a salary of several hundred thousand yuan a month plus the income from shops and land, and you take risks for a bribe of 500,000 yuan, the risks and costs of crime are too great. Once the corruption is investigated, it is really not worth it.

Therefore, among those investigated and punished, there were basically no corrupt officials. Only a few were found to have abused their power, while the majority were dismissed for being incompetent and having no political achievements.

The list was also carefully selected by Fan Zhongyan.

There were more than a hundred officials in the Lü Party, but most of them were powerless or held unimportant positions. Their existence was meaningless, so there was no need to remove them.

He dismissed members of the Lu Party from important departments such as the Twenty-Four Departments, the Three-Class Court, and the Censorate, which were members of the Lu Party's lower-level power institutions.

Laying off these people was a heavy blow to the Lu Party's middle and lower-level power in Bianliang.

Therefore, this can be said to be a great victory for the party.

But Fan Zhongyan did not feel complacent about this victory.

Because he understood that the Lu Party could not be considered a political party formed around Lu Yijian from the beginning to the end, but rather an alliance formed by Lu Yijian and their common interests.

Just like the relationship between Fan Zhongyan and Ouyang Xiu, these people may not necessarily obey Lu Yijian's orders, but if Fan Zhongyan wants to launch reforms, they will definitely stick together with Lu Yijian and resist the development of reforms.

Therefore, it is not enough to just destroy some middle and lower-level powerful officials of Lu Yijian's faction. If we really want to carry out reforms without obstacles in the future, none of the people on the list mentioned by Zhao Jun can be let go.

Fan Zhongyan's face was firm and he was thinking seriously.

The road to reform.

There is still a long way to go.

......

......

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