Chapter 420: Checking the Land

Now all European countries are discussing one thing: When will the Bartlan family rule Europe?

Throughout history, no family has ever been so powerful. The son is the heir to the Roman Empire, the Archon of Novgorod, the Elector of Brandenburg, the Duke of Normandy, and the daughter is the Queen and the Duchess. Whose children can all hold high positions? So many people are paying attention to Constantinople to see what actions the Roman emperor will take.

What ambitions can our emperor have? He just wants the family to last for a long time. To achieve this goal, the Roman Empire must be governed well.

The Senate experienced the most serious quarrel in history. Mircea suddenly announced that he would conduct a nationwide inventory of land and impose taxes based on the fertility and output of the land. This made the nobles who owned a lot of land feel that their wallets were going to be flat, and they wanted to tear the person who proposed this matter into pieces.

"Your Majesty, this matter needs to be considered in the long run. A hasty investigation will destabilize the foundation of the empire."

This time, all members of the Senate came to discuss the bill. Agricultural officer Osborne agreed with this proposal, which would be a great help to agriculture.

But some nobles still disagreed, after all, this was digging at their lifeblood.

"I say, what are you afraid of? Your Majesty is doing this for the long-term of the empire, not for the interests of certain people."

A representative of the Blue Party ridiculed the opponents, which made the Green Party members unable to stand it.

"You think you are the only one who cares about the empire. Do you know the consequences of doing this? How can those local nobles give up? Will they create difficulties for the government's decrees, will they rebel, will they refuse all cooperation? These are all things to consider."

"What do you mean by for the empire? I think you wish the empire would be like the Ottoman Empire, right?"

This directly angered the Blue Party members, and he quarreled directly in front of the emperor.

"What are you talking about? Of course, I am doing this for the future of the empire. Now we need to fill the treasury to prevent some people with ulterior motives from becoming criminals who embezzle the treasury."

"Humph, I don't know who is the criminal. Go to Ancyra and see Antioch, Yerevan, and Trebizond. The land there does not need to be cultivated. It is not enough to rely on the power of farmers. If you want to recover quickly, you have to give up some economic rights to others. Let some people get rich, so that they will use ten times the return to promote the local area."

Mircea was watching from above. He felt that such a quarrel could make him more aware of the attitudes of both parties.

"Ha, then you don't know that once some people get rich, they will find ways to exploit loopholes in the law. Tax evasion and concealment are still minor matters. What is more terrible is collusion with local officials to harm one side. Can you be responsible?"

"You always talk about filling the treasury. Let me ask you, do you know how much the empire's income was last year?"

"1,586,258 lei"

"What about expenditure?"

Finance Minister Baptiste solved this problem for him.

"Last year, the empire's expenditure totaled 1,442,597 lei."

"That's it. The treasury is very abundant at present. Your statement is completely untenable."

The Green Party was very proud, but he forgot that people engaged in industry and commerce are better at speaking and touching people's hearts.

"Who would complain about having too much money? Besides, this can find out a group of parasites and why they oppose the land inventory. They think they are superior and even ignore the emperor."

The Green Party had enough of the slander and verbal attacks of the Blue Party, and the representative shouted directly.

"The emperor rules the empire with the nobles, not with you commoners."

This directly shocked many people, because half of the people who did it were born as commoners or merchants, which also means that they are not qualified to discuss state governance here.

"You are threatening His Majesty. Are you planning a rebellion?"

"I know you have no good intentions."

"Come quickly, arrest him, there must be accomplices."

The quarrel eventually turned into a farce, and Mircea stopped everyone with a gloomy face. And drove out the rude representative. For this land inventory proposal, Mircea decided to implement it first in Wallachia and Moldova. These two places have the most fertile land and must have a lot of land to be reclaimed.

However, this also shows that the political differences in the country are getting bigger and bigger. The quarrels in the lower house can often last for a day, ranging from economy to military. They can only do this. After all, it is an advisory body, not a voting body.

This time, the land inventory proposal naturally caused a quarrel. The Blue Party joined other factions to give the Green Party a fatal blow, and the Green Party was not willing to lag behind and mobilized their own relationships to fight back.

And those land nobles and big landowners planned to exert pressure through the movement. In their view, the emperor still needs them to govern the local area. The bureaucracy will not last long. When there is something to make trouble, the officials can't handle it, and the emperor will not obediently hand over the power to himself.

The Roman Empire has seen everything. Stopping land annexation is an old tradition. It can be traced back to the reform of the Gracchus brothers. Basil II severely cracked down on big landowners and protected small farmers, which made the empire shine again.

Therefore, Mircea must continue to enforce such laws, which is also beneficial to population growth.

Mircea issued an order the next day to start operations in Wallachia and Moldova, and encouraged landless farmers in the Balkans to go to Anatolia and give them preferential policies.

The land nobles had almost no tricks to deal with the emperor's weakening. Apart from collecting money and having some control over serfs, they could not form an army, recruit soldiers, or go to Luoyang to complain to the emperor. Their only military way was to serve in the emperor's army and change from land rulers to officers and landlords under the emperor.

Of course, some nobles and landlords were able to take advantage of loopholes to obtain a large amount of land. For example, in the new territories, the government basically did not care about the purchase for the sake of development. There were also colonies. As long as you have money, you can buy land. Although there are restrictions, it is very relaxed compared to the domestic situation.

For example, in Ceylon, a landlord bought 1,000 acres of land at one time, and after the development, he had to buy a lot of land.

In India, the East India Company was the largest land buyer. They could easily turn the land and the farmers on the land into their own private property, which was particularly smooth in the south.

In the north, land purchases were still carried out around the port of Camille. They also hired a lot of people to work for their cities. A lot of cotton and flax began to be planted, and food was imported from other places. If the landlord wanted to leave his hometown, then buying land overseas was a good way.