Chapter 651: Overstaffing
Walking out of the main hall of the Dali Temple, Sun Shaozong took out his pocket watch and glanced at it, and found that it was almost noon [eleven o'clock]. He couldn't help but sigh inwardly.
Although he had discovered in the previous two days that the Dali Temple was overstaffed, today's roundtable meeting still refreshed Sun Shaozong's cognition.
The three officials of the Dali Temple gathered together for half a day to discuss whether or not to bring the white elephant into the palace to celebrate the emperor's birthday.
Dare you be more boring?!
Of course, this matter is not beyond discussion. After all, there is no precedent before. The year when Bai Xiang was conferred the title of the first rank happened to be Guangde’s tenth birthday. The old man from the capital was invited, and the civil and military officials had nothing to do with it.
Later, due to the solar eclipse, the Wanshou Festival was suspended for two consecutive years.
It was not until this year that the imperial court restored the custom of allowing fourth-rank civil and military officials in Beijing to enter the palace to celebrate the emperor's birthday on the day of his birthday.
This raises a question - should the white elephant, which only has the rank of a first-rank official, also be brought to celebrate the birthday according to its rank?
But even if you have doubts, there is no need to spend a whole morning quoting scriptures and talking endlessly, right? !
Why not just submit a memorial to the emperor and ask him, and the matter will be resolved?
In the final analysis, it's just that I'm bored!
Sun Shaozong was disdainful and depressed , so he went straight to the Zuosi Yamen. However, he was not in a hurry to return to his own office. Instead, he took the opportunity to take a look around inside and out.
It has been the third day since he took office in the Dali Temple, but he has not even figured out the structure of the left temple's subordinate offices. This is not Sun Shaozong's usual style as an official.
You wouldn't know until you take a look around. Once you take a look around, you will find that this Zuo Temple's government office is a complete waste of space for office use - nearly half of the temple's courtyards are built beside the water, dotted with seven or eight pavilions and red pavilions, all of which offer a panoramic view of the lake and water.
In one of the courtyards, they even used a waterwheel and bamboo pipes to divert a stream, and performed the trick of "Qu Shui Liu Shang".
Judging from the traces, these facilities should be used frequently, with a frequency far exceeding that of the inner hall in the center used for solving cases.
Being an official is almost like being on vacation!
Alas~
It is true that if the upper beam is crooked, the lower beams will also be crooked.
With a lot of thoughts in his mind, he shook his head and sighed as he returned to his office. When he entered the office, he saw Liu Xianglian picking up some copper plates - it was time to order food.
Sun Shaozong came over to take a quick look and found that the food was much richer than that in the Criminal Law Department, and there were also several special dishes made specifically with seafood from Shichahai.
After picking out a dozen or so fresh dishes at random, Sun Shaozong gave instructions to the kitchen helpers and called the temple secretary Yang Zhiming to come and have dinner together.
"two……"
When the servant took the order and left, Liu Xianglian's face suddenly fell. He opened his mouth to call out to his second brother, but suddenly remembered that he was in the government office, so he quickly changed his words and said , "Dong Weng, you were so busy yesterday, and today I worked so hard, but I sat here all morning and didn't even see a single bird feather!"
"Just call me Second Brother. It doesn't sound right to call me Dong Weng or not Dong Weng."
As Sun Shaozong spoke, he went into the inner room, spread out paper and pen on the sour pear wood desk, took out an ingot of Jijin ink produced by Jiyuanzhai, filled it with water and ground it in the Duan inkstone.
Seeing this, Liu Xianglian hurriedly grabbed it in his hand, fiddling with it while complaining: "Second brother, I'm here to be your advisor, I can't just sit there doing nothing, can I?"
"What's the hurry?"
Sun Shaozong sat down on the high-backed chair, combed the purple hair on the tip of the brush with his fingers, and said with a slight grin: "I, your second brother, am a pendant. Since I have come to the Dali Temple to serve as an official, I will not keep playing tricks with them to blend in with the world."
At this point, he suddenly remembered his promise to bring Zhao Nan to help Liu Xianglian, but he went to bed too early yesterday and delayed this matter.
Then he added, "I'll bring you the helper tomorrow. Before you get too busy, get to know him better, so as to avoid..."
"grown ups!"
As he was speaking, he heard someone shouting outside.
Seeing that Liu Xianglian was still grinding ink, Sun Shaozong gave him a helpless look. Then he suddenly realized what was going on and hurriedly left the Duan inkstone to go out to deal with it.
Although the ink had not been completely ground, it was barely enough for drafting.
So Sun Shaozong picked up his brush, dipped it in some ink, and scribbled on the snow-white rice paper without any coherent words.
Soon, Liu Xianglian brought in the left temple secretary Yang Zhiming. Seeing that Sun Shaozong was writing quickly, Yang Zhiming stopped Liu Xianglian from reporting, moved to the corner, and stood by with a 35-degree bow.
Sun Shaozong didn't even raise , but asked, "What cases are there in our temple that are awaiting trial?"
Yang Zhiming lowered his body and smiled, "To answer your question, sir, apart from the case of the Ministry of Revenue, there are three county magistrates, one deputy magistrate, and the Ningbo Prefecture garrison commander in custody awaiting trial."
When I was in Shuntian Prefecture before, I mostly handled cases involving ordinary people. But now that I'm in the Dali Temple, it seems like "only officials are allowed to enter."
He pressed on, "What are the charges? Send the files to me this afternoon, and we'll clear them up before the Emperor's birthday. It will also be a way of celebrating His Majesty's birthday."
"this……"
Yang Zhiming looked up at Sun Shaozong and saw that he was still writing furiously. He could not tell what he was thinking. He could only reply awkwardly, "Most of them are corrupt officials. Only the Ningbo garrison commander was impeached by Taiwei Wang and imprisoned because he missed the opportunity to fight."
At this point, he swallowed his saliva and continued, "Those corrupt officials are being held here, but the results of the search and the specific charges have not yet been sent to us from the Censorate, so... so it's probably difficult to convict them."
"As for the Ningbo garrison, according to the rules, the Ministry of War must first conduct a thorough investigation of the crime of delaying the battle, and then report the results to us."
Sun Shaozong finally stopped writing when he heard this, looked up at Yang Zhiming and said, "So, we, the dignified Dali Temple, can only wait for others to investigate everything and then pronounce the sentence according to the script?"
Being stared at by those eagle-like eyes, Yang Zhiming's heart began to beat fast. He swallowed several times before mustering up the courage to smile and say, "This... this is also a precedent in previous years. Besides, the criminal was arrested by the Metropolitan Procuratorate after all, so it's not right for us to interfere casually."
"A precedent? Haha..."
Sun Shaozong sneered. When the retired emperor first ascended the throne, he appointed the famous minister Xu Qin as the chief minister of the Dali Temple. At that time, the reputation of the Dali Temple once overshadowed the Ministry of Justice and the Censorate.
At that time, I had never heard of the three words "wait, rely on, and ask" that were the established practice of the Dali Temple.
Of course, in Sun Shaozong's view, the biggest problem of the Dali Temple is not the bureaucratic style, but the fact that the system itself is extremely out of touch with reality.
In name, the provincial judicial commissioners' offices were under the jurisdiction of the Three Judicial Departments.
However, the Dali Temple did not have the power to appoint and examine criminal officials like the Ministry of Justice, nor did it have the duty to inspect officials like the Censorate, and it also did not have censors stationed in various provinces.
In addition, the Ministry of Justice and the Censorate are both of the second-rank structure, while the highest rank in the Dali Temple is only the third rank, which is the same level as the provincial prosecutors - the hierarchy is not so reliable.
If there was a capable minister with sufficient prestige sitting in the Dali Temple and actively inviting major cases from all over the country, perhaps it would not be a big deal.
But once it encounters someone like Wei Yi who just gets by, the Dali Temple becomes almost a decoration.
If we want to reverse this situation, it is not reliable to expect that every Dali Temple Minister is a capable official.
If we really want to change this situation, we must start with the system and let the Dali Temple take root in the local area, rather than being high and mighty, domineering, sedentary and useless.
Of course, this kind of change cannot be achieved overnight.
Fortunately, Sun Shaozong had just arrived, so there was still plenty of time to kill with them - and some of the concepts and practices of the court system of later generations might be able to be used as a reference.
