Traveling south from Luoyang, it took about another day or two. Along the way, the implementation of the land distribution decree, the final step in the land reform, was going quite well in all the localities.
Overall, under Zhu Yunwen's tough policies, coupled with the intervention of the Ministry of Justice, all the powerful and influential scholar-officials and nobles in the localities who wanted to resist the land distribution decree eventually gave in.
Zhu Yunwen's policy was correct. He always held the view that it was always much easier to be an enemy of the minority than the majority.
Implementing land reform is beneficial to the country and to the people.
Even if it offends a few local nobles, these nobles are already living very well, so affecting their interests is not worth mentioning.
It only causes them to lose some benefits they shouldn't have received, but these methods can also allow those who have no benefit to gain something, thus reducing the gap between the rich and the poor.
This is absolutely a good thing for the people of the world.
They often receive strong support from the people.
These scholar-official and aristocratic classes had to withstand pressure from the imperial court and government above, and also face resistance from the common people below.
Even if they wanted to, they were powerless.
In fact, the reason why the scholar-official and aristocratic class was able to gain a foothold in previous dynasties was simply because they had the support of the imperial court, coupled with their exploitation of the local people.
The common people dared not resist, because if they did, the court's laws would likely be applied to them, and at times, the court's laws were just a joke to those in power.
But for ordinary people, it is a red line that they can never cross.
Therefore, from a certain perspective, the laws of past dynasties sometimes failed to protect ordinary people and instead constrained them.
These same laws, however, fail to restrain the powerful and influential; instead, they protect them.
Therefore, in the past, imperial power was a means and weapon used by the scholar-official and aristocratic class to suppress the common people. Similarly, the imperial power relied on the scholar-official and aristocratic class to firmly control the local people.
Whether the common people lived well or were able to survive was not that important to the rulers and the scholar-official class of many dynasties.
Zhu Yunwen now aims to break this unfair so-called rule and establish a new system, a system that is not so traditional and ensures equality for all.
This might have been difficult to implement in ancient times, but if successful, the Ming Dynasty would have been even more stable.
The people have never been parasites on a country, but rather its solid foundation and even its pillars.
Only the scholar-official class and the aristocracy, who exploit and oppress the common people and abuse imperial power, become parasites in this society.
As a person from a later era, Zhu Yunwen clearly understood what kind of people the country needed and didn't need, how to ensure its longevity, and how to hasten its demise.
Therefore, although it would be difficult to implement the republican and communist society he envisioned in ancient times, he still had to try with some strong measures.
In fact, this path was followed by people in later generations, namely, uniting the power of the common people to overthrow capitalism.
In ancient times, wasn't capitalism precisely what the scholar-official and aristocratic classes embodied?
Therefore, as long as Zhu Yunwen follows this method, he believes it will definitely be successful. At least the current land reform has already shown some results.
The local aristocratic and scholar-official class could not withstand the pressure from the imperial court and government, nor could they withstand the resistance from the common people.
On the issue of land reform, they could only compromise.
After all, the imperial court no longer supported them, and the common people at the grassroots level, on the contrary, had the support of the imperial court and began to rebel against the scholar-official class.
If we don't compromise, things could escalate to an even more serious extreme.
This was the outcome that Zhu Yunwen was willing to see.
At least he saw many people who had each been allocated two or three acres of land, and they were all smiles as they began to diligently cultivate the land.
Finally, the people of the world no longer have to live like before, without their own land, forced to work for others and be their tenants!
Along the way, the policies had been implemented wherever he went, but when he arrived in Jingzhou Prefecture, a change occurred when Zhu Yunwen passed through a village.
Although some people were working in the fields, they did not seem to have any happy expressions on their faces.
This puzzled Zhu Yunwen, who stepped forward to ask:
"Gentlemen, now that the imperial court has distributed land to you, why do you seem rather unhappy?"
Upon hearing Zhu Yunwen's words, the villagers working in the field all looked at him.
One of the old men sighed and said:
"It's a good thing that the imperial court allocated land to us, and we are grateful to the court. We were very happy at the time. But in the end, this land still isn't ours. How can we be happy?"
Upon hearing this, Zhu Yunwen frowned and asked:
"What does this mean? Since the imperial court has allocated land to you, how can you say that this land ultimately isn't yours?"
When Zhu Yunwen asked, the surrounding commoners also showed helpless expressions.
They seemed hesitant to speak, and after a moment of hesitation, a young man stepped forward with some doubt and said to Zhu Yunwen:
"I see that you have an extraordinary bearing, young master. Could it be that you are a member of the imperial court?"
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