Abstract
Zhang Juzheng became the most powerful man in China on August 4, 1572. On that date, he began to direct affairs of state on behalf of Zhu Yijun (1563–1620), also known as the Wanli emperor, who was then only a boy. This rather unusual political arrangement lasted about ten years and turned out to be momentous enough to merit its own special phrase in Chinese historiography, Jiangling bingzheng, which best translates as “Zhang Juzheng’s administration.” The single-minded purpose of Zhang’s administration, in the words of Ming dynasty survivor and chronicler Tan Qian (1594–1658), was “to build respect for the sovereign power” (zhuan zun zhuquan).1
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Notes
Tan Qian, Guo que, ch. 68, reprinted in Tan Qian, Guo que (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1988), vol. 5, p. 4193. “Jiangling,” in “Jiangling bingzheng,” refers to Zhang’s ancestral home and hence to Zhang.
Wei Qingyuan, Zhang Juzheng he Mingdai zhonghouqi zhengju ( Guangzhou: Gaodeng jiaoyu chubanshe, 1999 ), p. 79
The tendency to withdraw from government service is discussed in Timothy Brook, Praying for Power: Buddhism and the Formation of Gentry Society in Late-Ming China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1993), pp. 312–316
Fei Xiaotong, “Lun shenshi,” in Wu Han and Fei Xiaotong, Huangquan yu shenquan ( Tianjin: Tianjin renmin chubanshe, 1988 ), p. 8.
Edward L. Dreyer, Early Ming China: A Political History, 1355–1435 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1982), pp. 212–215, 222
Tan Tianxing, Mingdai neige zhengzhi (Beijing: Zhongguo shehui kexue chubanshe, 1996), esp. pp. 35–41.
Wei Qingyuan, Zhang Juzheng, pp. 523, 918–920; Tan Qian, Guo que, ch. 68, reprinted in Tan Qian, vol. 5, p. 4227; Zhang Juzheng, “Qing ji cha zhang zou sui shi kao cheng yi xiu shizheng shu,” Zhang Juzheng ji, ch. 3, reprinted in Zhang Juzheng, Zhang Juzheng ji (Hubei: Jingchu shushe, 1987), vol. 1, pp. 131–133
Zhu Dongrun, Zhang Juzheng dazhuan (Taipei: Taiwan kaiming shudian, reprint of 1945 edition), pp. 169–170.
Zhang Juzheng, “Da Yingtian xunfu Song Yangshan lun jun liang zu min,” Zhang Juzheng ji, ch. 19, reprinted in Zhang Juzheng, Zhang Juzheng ji, vol. 2, pp. 481–482. The Yingtian grand coordinator’s jurisdiction included the ten prefectures of Yingtian, Huizhou, Ningguo, Chizhou, Taiping, Anqing, Suzhou, Songjiang, Changzhou, and Zhenjiang, as well as overlapping military regions. See Wu Tingxie, Ming du fu nianbiao (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1982), vol. 2, p. 346.
Robert Crawford, “Chang Chu-cheng’s Confucian Legalism,” in Wm. Theodore de Bary and the Conference on Ming Thought (eds.), Self and Society in Ming Thought ( New York: Columbia University Press, 1970 ), pp. 386–390.
Frederic Wakeman Jr., “Introduction,” in Frederic Wakeman Jr. and Carolyn Grant (eds.), Conflict and Control in Late Imperial China ( Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975 ), p. 4
Frederic Wakeman Jr., The Fall of Imperial China ( New York: Free Press, 1977 ), pp. 19–37
Wu Han, “Lun shenquan,” in Wu Han and Fei Xiaotong, Huangquan yu shenquan ( Tianjin: Tianjin renmin chubanshe, 1988 ), pp. 49–51
See also Gao Shouxian, “Wan Ming de difang jingying yu xiangcun kongzhi,” in Wan Ming (ed.), Wan Ming shehui bianqian: wenti yu yanjiu ( Beijing: Shangwu yinshuguan, 2005 ), pp. 268–269.
Zhang Juzheng, “Qing shen jiu zhang shi xuezheng yi zhenxing rencai shu,” Zhang Juzheng ji, ch. 4, reprinted in Zhang Juzheng, Zhang Juzheng ji, vol. 1, pp. 172–177
Jaret Wayne Weisfogel, “Confucians, the Shih Class, and the Ming Imperium: Uses of Canonical and Dynastic Authority in Kuan Chi-tao’s (1536–1608) Proposals for Following the Men of Former Times to Safeguard Customs (Ts’ung-hsien wei-su I)” (Ph.D. diss., Columbia University, 2002 ), pp. 286–287.
Zhang Juzheng, “Da Yingtian xunfu Song Yangshan,” Zhang Juzheng ji, ch. 21, reprinted in Zhang Juzheng, Zhang Juzheng ji, vol. 2, pp. 575–576. Zhang’s habit of using private letters to coach underlings on how to write official documents is discussed in Ray Huang, 1587, A Year of No Significance: The Ming Dynasty in Decline ( New Haven: Yale University Press, 1981 ), p. 64.
Zhang Juzheng, “Da Yingtian xunfu lun da zheng da dian,” Zhang Juzheng ji, ch. 21, reprinted in Zhang Juzheng, Zhang Juzheng ji, vol. 2, pp. 594–595. Fan Jinmin, “Ming Qing Jiangnan zhong fu wenti shulun,” Zhongguo jingji shi yanjiu 3 (1996), p. 110, shows that, by late Ming, Jiangnan, which occupied 7% of the empire’s land, was paying 21% of the empire’s taxes
Ho Ping-ti, The Ladder of Success in Imperial China (New York: Columbia University Press, 1962), pp. 226–233, shows the prominence of southerners among the elite.
Wang Yinglin and Wang Qiao, (Wanli) Zhenjiang fu zhi (1596), ch. 5, p. 22b.
Hu Zhi, “Daliqing Song Huayang xiansheng xingzhuang,” Heng lu xu gao, ch. 6, p. 8b, reprinted in Si ku quan shu (Taipei: Taiwan Commercial Press, 1986), vol. 1287, p. 727
Ming shi lie zhuan, ch. 81, reprinted in Xu Qianxue, Ming shi lie zhuan (Taipei: Taiwan xuesheng shuju, 1970), p. 3879.
Zhang Juzheng, “Da Yingtian xunfu Hu Yazhai yan yanzhi wei shanai,” Zhang Juzheng ji, ch. 22, reprinted in Zhang Juzheng, Zhang Juzheng ji, vol. 2, p. 692; Crawford, “Chang Chu-cheng’s Confucian Legalism,” pp. 386–390; Hanfeizi, ch. 50, in Wm. Theodore de Bary and Irene Bloom (eds.), Sources of Chinese Tradition ( New York: Columbia University Press, 1999 ), p. 206
Wang Xianshen (ed.), Hanfeizi jijie (Taipei: Taiwan Commercial Press, 1968), ch. 4, p. 68.
Liu Gao et al. (eds.), Danyang xian zhi (Qing Guangxu ed.), ch. 3, pp. 3a–4b; Martin Heijdra, “The Socio-economic Development of Rural China during the Ming,” in Denis Twitchett and Frederick W. Mote (eds.), The Cambridge History of China (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), vol. 8, pp. 564–567.
Guo Houan (ed.), Ming shilu jingji xiliao xuanbian ( Beijing: Zhongguo shehui kexue chubanshe, 1989 ), p. 965.
Lin Li-yueh, “Du Mingshi jishii benmo: Jiangling bingzheng; jian lun Ming mo Qing chu ji zhong Zhang Juzheng zhuan zhong de shilun,” Guoli Taiwan Shifan Daxue lishi xuebao 24 (June, 1996), p. 59
Ray Huang, “The Ming Fiscal Administration,” in Denis Twitchett and Frederick W. Mote (eds.), The Cambridge History of China (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), vol. 8, pp. 133–134; Wei Qingyuan, Zhang Juzheng, p. 600.
Jiao Hong, “Zhang liang,” Jiao shi bi cheng xu ji, ch. 3, p. 18b, reprinted in Jinling congshu (Taipei: Li xing shuju, 1970), vol. 12, p. 6486
Roger V. Des Forges, Cultural Centrality and Political Change in Chinese History: Northeast Henan in the Fall of the Ming (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2003), pp. 29–31; Zhu Xuan and Zhou Ji, Qi xian zhi, ch. 9, p. 6a, ch. 21, pp. 11a–13a (Taipei: Chengwen chubanshe, 1976), pp. 515, 1363–1367. Jiao referred to Duan by his zi, or style name, which was Shao.
Fang Yang, “Zhangtian gao chenghuang wen,” Fang Chu-an xiansheng ji (1612 ed.), ch. 8, pp. 20b–21b.
Xie Guozhen, Mingdai shehui jingji shiliao xuanbian (Fuzhou: Fujian renmin chubanshe, 1980), vol. 3, p. 145.
Zhang Haiying, Zhang Juzheng gaige yu Shanxi Wanli qingzhang yanjiu (Taiyuan: Shanxi renmin chubanshe, 1993), pp. 210, 218–219.
Xie Guozhen, Mingdai shehui jingji shiliao xuanbian, vol. 3, pp. 187–188. Timothy Brook, The Confusions of Pleasure: Commerce and Culture in Ming China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999), p. 16, lists a Li Yue (with the above-mentioned dates), but the present writer has heard Mr. Li’s two-character name pronounced as Li Le as well.
Heijdra, pp. 447–449; Hilary J. Beattie, Land and Lineage in China: A Study of T’ung-Ch’eng County, Anhwei, in the Ming and Ch’ing Dynasties ( Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979 ), pp. 62–63.
Tan Qian, Guo que, ch. 71, reprinted in Tan Qian, vol. 5, pp. 4394; Long Wenbin (ed.), Ming hui yao, ch. 513 ( Taipei: Shijie shuju, 1960 ), pp. 984–986
Ping-ti Ho, Studies on the Population of China, 1368–1953 ( Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1959 ), pp. 101–135.
Heinrich Busch, “Ku Hsien-ch’eng,” in L. Carrington Goodrich and Chaoying Fang (eds.), Dictionary of Ming Biography, 1368–1644 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1976), p. 745; Tan Qian, Guo que, ch. 71, reprinted in Tan Qian, vol. 5, pp. 4406, 4412–4414.
Mizoguchi Yuzo (Suo Jieran and Gong Ying, trans.), Zhongguo qianjindai sixiang de yanbian ( Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1997 ), p. 371
Edward Kelley, “Miao Ch’ang-ch’i,” in L. Carrington Goodrich and Chaoying Fang (eds.), Dictionary of Ming Biography, 1368–1644 ( New York: Columbia University Press, 1976 ), p. 1067.
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© 2009 Harry Miller
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Miller, H. (2009). Zhang Juzheng, 1572–1582. In: State versus Gentry in Late Ming Dynasty China, 1572–1644. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230617872_2
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