"Lord Xiaoguan!"
Eunuch Jia bowed and smiled, "Your Majesty invites you to the Council Chamber for a discussion."
Fu Xiaoguan was stunned. In the past, His Majesty always met him in the Imperial Study, so why did he change to the Council of State today?
The Council of State was the highest authority in the Yu Dynasty, with six ministries under its jurisdiction, and now a seventh ministry, the Ministry of Commerce, has been added.
Logically, the highest administrative officer of the Political Affairs Hall, the Minister of State Affairs, a second-rank official, should have held all power, but this was not the case in the Yu Dynasty.
Fu Xiaoguan now understood that the highest administrative chief of the Political Affairs Hall was the prime minister. The Yu Dynasty was different from the Wu Dynasty. The Wu Dynasty had two prime ministers, the left and the right, who checked and balanced each other's power, but the Yu Dynasty had only one prime minister.
Therefore, more than 30 years after the founding of the Yu Dynasty, in order to check and balance the power of the prime minister, the Zhengshitang government office was established.
At that time, the Political Affairs Hall was in charge of the six ministries. One person completely sidelined the Prime Minister, which led to the excessive power of the Political Affairs Hall. So after fifty years of turmoil, it was changed to what it is today -
The prime minister led the Council of State and the Privy Council, and both the Councillor of State and the Privy Council had the right to veto the prime minister's proposals. At the same time, the Councillor of State was in charge of the system of censors outside the six ministries, called the Jianyuan.
The Censorate was very special. It was composed of a group of angry young people, all of whom were highly educated. Its original purpose was to supervise all civil and military officials, to sharply criticize those officials who did not act or committed crimes, and to report the results to the Vice-Chancellor. The Vice-Chancellor had the right to submit these officials' memorials to the emperor to impeach the official.
Therefore, officials of the Censorate also participated in court affairs, but they did not express their opinions on political affairs. They targeted people.
This required these officials to be self-disciplined and not to form cliques for personal gain, so all of them were poor and incorruptible. The Censorate was jokingly called the Qingfeng Hall.
Just this morning at the court session, Huang Zhong, the Right Palace Attendant of the Censorate, launched an impeachment against Fu Xiaoguan. Forty of the seventy-nine officials of the Censorate signed the impeachment memorial, which was then sent to Qin Huizhi, the Vice-Chancellor of the Council of State Affairs. Qin Huizhi naturally submitted the memorial to the emperor.
The content of the impeachment is that Fu Xiaoguan is incompetent as the Minister of Commerce!
"Your servant, Huang Zhong, was a Jinshi in the 36th year of the Taihe reign. In the 38th year of the Taihe reign, I entered the imperial court as an official. With the Emperor's grace and good conduct, I was admitted to the Censorate.
As a minister receiving your salary, I should share your worries. However, there are demons and evil spirits in the court, seeking to disrupt the government. Therefore, I have exercised my authority to expose this individual. I hope Your Majesty will conduct a fair and thorough investigation of this person!
This boy's name is Fu Xiaoguan! He was favored by the emperor and at the age of seventeen he was appointed to head the Ministry of Commerce, a position of the third rank. This is truly a great favor from the emperor!
However, I have been observing this boy for a long time and have realized that his virtue is unworthy of his position and there is solid evidence that he has deceived Your Majesty.
This man holds a high position but behaves lazily. He never reports for work or sits in court. He is free and undisciplined, coming and going as he pleases. He regards the Ministry of Commerce as his own, disregards the rules of the court, and treats Your Majesty's grace as dirt!
This fellow has formed a clique for personal gain. The Ministry of Commerce currently has thirty-four members, all of whom were recruited by him, and not a single one has passed the vetting process at the Political Affairs Hall. I have investigated this matter carefully and am deeply alarmed!
Among these thirty-four people, except Li Cai who was originally an official of the Ministry of Revenue, thirty of the remaining thirty-three people were from the Imperial Academy!
Among these thirty people, only three were Jinshi in this year's imperial examination, and the remaining twenty-seven had not yet achieved the title of Jinshi.
What’s even more outrageous is that three of them actually came from the public!
I continued to investigate and found that these three people were all sons of merchants from Jinling. They were only scholars, but they held high positions in the Ministry of Commerce!
I am uneasy every day and cannot sleep every night.
Fu Xiaoguan ignored national regulations and won over a group of rabble under the banner of promoting new policies. What was his intention?
Is he really going to implement the new policy?
I think he is playing this as a joke and is harming the country!
I am well aware of Fu Xiaoguan's talent and reputation, and I am also well aware of Fu Xiaoguan's background, but I cannot watch this villain disrupt the government, abuse his power for personal gain, and even try to plot against the country!
Therefore, I implore Your Majesty to thoroughly investigate all of Fu Xiaoguan's actions and uncover his evil intentions and wolfish ambitions!
I, along with my colleagues in the Censorate, respectfully request Your Majesty's holy judgment!"
Since it was an imperial judgment, it had to be decided in the Council of Censors and officials from the three provinces and six ministries in the Council of State Affairs.
Emperor Xuan was also very depressed about this matter.
He knew the whole story of how Fu Xiaoguan had dealt with these people, but since the impeachment memorial from the Censorate had been handed to him, he could not change the rules.
This requires Fu Xiaoguan to prove it himself.
After reading the impeachment memorial, Fu Xiaoguan scratched his head, glanced at the emperor, and thought to himself, it's just such a trivial matter, can't you just suppress it?
He doesn't know that once it involves the impeachment of officials, it cannot be suppressed.
As the direct manager of the Jianyuan, Qin Huizhi personally presided over the impeachment, so he said:
"Are you Mr. Fu?"
Fu Xiaoguan was startled. He suddenly looked at Qin Huizhi and smiled brightly. "Could it be that Lord Qin has an eye disease?"
"This is the rule! The Censorate has impeached you. If you cannot prove your innocence, then this impeachment will take effect. Besides... this is not your Ministry of Commerce!"
Qin Huizhi narrowed his eyes slightly. This sentence was naturally said to His Majesty, Prime Minister Yan, and the six ministers.
Fu Xiaoguan turned his head and saw that in the huge government hall, His Majesty was sitting at the top, Yan Beixi was on His Majesty's right, and Qin Huizhi was on His Majesty's left. Officials from the other six ministries were on both sides, and officials from the Court of Censors were sitting behind him. This seemed no different from a trial in three courts.
You all are sitting, why should I stand?
So he turned to look at the officials of the Censorate and asked, "Who is Huang Zhong?"
Huang Zhong was shocked. Could it be that this young official Fu dared to retaliate?
He stood up and said, "This is me, Mr. Fu. Is there a single false statement in my memorial?"
Fu Xiaoguan looked at him with a smile and walked straight over, startling the group of people. Even Qin Huizhi slammed the table and stood up suddenly, "Fu Xiaoguan, how dare you!"
Fu Xiaoguan picked his ears and continued walking. He was in front of Huang Zhong. Huang Zhong opened his eyes wide, took a step back, and then took another step back. Fu Xiaoguan smiled at him and picked up Huang Zhong's stool. "Master Huang, why are you so nervous? I just want to sit on the stool."
He took a stool and sat down in the middle of the hall. Behind him, Lord Huang Zhonghuang, ashamed of his previous retreat, took two steps forward, pointed at Fu Xiaoguan and said angrily: "Your Majesty, this ignorant child does not know his king and father, has no respect for his superiors, and disregards the law. His morality is despicable..."
Fu Xiaoguan suddenly turned around, his face as cold as frost, "You old bastard, shut up!"
The whole room was filled with solemn silence!
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