Chapter 485 The Administrative System of the Papal States
"Ah!"

Halkin sneezed loudly, interrupting Horn's speech.

Seeing everyone looking at him, Halkin smiled awkwardly and said, "Sorry, sorry, I couldn't help it."

Horn laughed and said, "It's September now, the weather is indeed getting colder, everyone remember to wear more clothes and don't catch a cold."

This was Horn's first regular meeting since returning to Chateau Jeanne from Autumnset Island.

The announcement of the new tax system at this regular meeting has become the biggest topic in the Papal State of Savior in the past two days.

"So, does everyone agree to the proposal to change the name of Kush County to Red Maple Township?" Horn raised his head and asked, putting the documents in his hand aside.

"agree."

"I'll be the first to agree."

"I totally agree!"

Looking at Saint Jeanne's silly smile, probably no one would dare to express any disagreement at this moment.

"Okay, this proposal is over, and we will move on to the next topic: "Proposal for the Reform of the Bureaucratic System of Church Orders in 1445"

The opening is as usual, with some unimportant small topics, and the finale is often at the end.

The bureaucratic reform plan, which ranks second to last, is definitely one of the heavyweights.

Given the current domestic and international situation, Horn is well aware that they cannot establish a constitutional system and can only choose an absolutist centralized system.

He originally considered himself to be of little talent and knowledge, and wanted to leave the establishment of centralized power to specialized scholars.

But Horn found that the scholars had no idea what centralization meant and the suggestions they put forward were a mess.

There are local councils, or each village appoints a village chief to manage it, or even a reversal of the trend to make the centurion hereditary.

In the end, Horn was shocked to find that they had no idea how to establish a centralized system.

Even the Kingdom of France, which claims to be an absolute monarchy, has not yet fully completed its centralized system.

Now, Horn, a delivery man, has become a political scientist.

After all, in this era, no one understands centralization better than him.

There was no other choice but to do it myself, so I came up with the current plan.

Horn has always believed that the first step in any so-called political reform is to govern officials.

No matter how good the law is, if the executors are incompetent, it will only lead to three results:
Formalism, lip service and over-enforcement.

The Salvation Army is currently able to carry out effective administration, firstly because its territory is small, and secondly because Horn has a group of young generals who obey orders without thinking.

Of course, there is also his own huge prestige and the propaganda effect of Armand's Ministry of Truth.

But this means that Horn is a charismatic leader, like a khan on the steppe.

The entire country is held together by him, and if he dies or loses his political power, the Salvation Army will collapse in a few years.

This is actually a common problem among most peasant uprisings.

So what Horn brought out was this special modified version of bureaucracy, in which the government became a machine rather than a reflection of a certain person.

"The first point of this new plan is the division of administrative divisions, which has a lot to do with our newly introduced bureaucracy." Sitting behind the round table, representatives of governments at all levels on both sides sat on benches and listened attentively.

"This bureaucratic system is simple to explain. Let's take Kush Territory, uh, Red Maple Township as an example..."

According to the current household registration survey, each 450-household area has approximately 600-512 people. Hongfeng Township currently has 20 -household areas, with a population of approximately people.

Originally, these hundred-household districts were directly managed by Jeanne d'Arc, and the hundred-household districts were on the same level as towns.

But as Horn's current territory expands, the government team is beginning to feel overwhelmed.

Hongfeng Township has a population of 20, Yibe Township has a population of 18, Jinhe Township has a population of 25, Gouhu Township has a population of 15, Zhehe Township has a population of 32, and Daze Township has a population of 5.

The territory currently belonging to the Salvation Army is 32000 square kilometers and the population is nearly 120 million.

The 20 people in Red Maple Township are enough to make Horn exhausted. This number has increased sixfold, which is definitely beyond the current administrative capacity of the Salvation Army government.

Therefore, the first step of the "1445 Bureaucratic Reform Plan" was to subdivide administrative divisions and establish priestly orders.

The so-called priestly order is an order of deacons composed of itinerant monks from several centuries, responsible for the political and economic work of the entire region and electing an abbot.

For example, a priestly order has 70 centuries and 1 town under its jurisdiction, which means 8 itinerant friars.

The superior order will promote one archdeacon from among the eight itinerant monks. The promoted archdeacon will no longer patrol the various hundred-household districts, but will be stationed in the deacons' order to preside over daily work.

The 10 centuries where he was located would re-elect or have new itinerant monks appointed by the Papal Palace.

These nine people form the main administrative force of a deacon order.

Of course, this does not mean that only nine of them are needed to complete Horn's decree. After all, a priestly order manages 9 to people.

The priestly order would have a church for administration, usually in a town, and employ its own assistants.

In addition to presiding over daily work, the superior monk can also nominate administrative officers to the superior order, such as clerks, financial officers, judicial officers, etc.

These affairs officers are only responsible for assisting in daily administrative work and are considered assistants.

Actual decisions are made by the itinerant monks at their meetings, and any decision must be voted on at the meeting.

Each priestly order also has two or three secretarial monks from the Congregation of the Holy Fathers. They do not participate in any administrative work, but only do one thing, which is to record every meeting and make a copy to send to the Papal Palace and the superior order.

If something goes wrong in the future, the minutes of the meeting will be important evidence for the blame-shifting meeting.

Thus, the 512 hundred-household districts of Hongfeng Township became seven priestly congregations, and the 7 people of Yibei Township became 18 hundred-household districts and six priestly congregations.

Horn's jurisdiction was changed from 999 centuries to 13 priestly orders.

However, this is not the end. All the priests in a town must form a town religious institute.

Taking Ibe Township as an example, six superiors of priestly orders and one appointed priest chief will form a township religious order.

The priestly institute is responsible to the local institute, but the local institute cannot appoint superiors, only itinerant friars and stewards.

The Imperial Council of Cardinals may appoint the Prior.

The local religious institute is responsible to the Imperial Conference of Cardinals, but the Imperial Conference cannot appoint priors, only superiors and local officials.

Horn can ordain priests.

In addition, the Congregation of the Holy Fathers, the Holy Virgin, the Imperial Council of Cardinals, the Cheka, and all the military forces were all responsible to Horn alone.

If Horn has to manage multiple counties in the future, there may be county-level orders.

"...In this way, the division of bureaucracy is clear." Under the focused gaze of the crowd, Horn raised his fingers one by one, "Itinerant monk - Head monk - Head priest - Chaplain - Cardinal."

Since the bureaucracy is only formed by appointments from the Salvation Army government, the centurions or mayors elected from below are not part of the bureaucracy.

If these grassroots officials and administrative officers perform well, they can be nominated by their superiors to enter the Holy Father College on Qiumu Island.

Upon graduation, they are automatically granted the status of a robed friar, similar to the status of a sword-bearing friar among officers.

They, like other Salvation Army nationals, are friars.

It’s just that the former is responsible for administrative work, while the latter is responsible for military work.

"Your Majesty, but I would like to ask, what is the difference between this and before?" Hakuto couldn't help but raise his hand and asked.

This is also the question of most people present. The original Salvation Army government system was quite good. What's the point of replacing it?
Horn smiled slightly and said, “In the past, I would come up with a statement, such as if we wanted to build a canal throughout the township, and decide which area would build what and which area would build what.

Okay, everyone, take your tasks and go do them... What do you think?"

"What's wrong?"

Instead, the other participants were surprised.

"That would be too rigid. One township is fine, but what if it's a county? What if it's the entire Thousand River Valley?" Horn knocked his knuckles on the table. "By that time, I'll have to spend a whole day just listening to reports and issuing orders!"

"We can appoint a governor for each township." Some clever guy suggested loudly, "Wouldn't it be better to let him decide these matters?"

"Foetentes soni, stulta verba (Old Elian)." Catherine couldn't help but whispered in a low voice.

"Aren't you afraid that he will betray us and start a civil war with us?" Busak stood up and shouted towards the direction where the voice came from.

"Why don't we send someone to supervise him?"

"Then how can we ensure that the people who supervise him will not be turned against him?"

"Or maybe we can send a few more people and let them check and balance each other."

Some people in the crowd raised their opinions in a disorderly manner, but most of these issues had already been discussed by Horn at the meeting of cardinals in front of the emperor, so they were refuted one by one by the cardinals.

"Silence! Silence!" Thomas knocked on the table with a wooden hammer and shouted as the great-grandson of the saint, forcing the crowd to be quiet again.

Horn continued slowly:
“You have all discovered the drawbacks of the old process, now listen to the new process.

I proposed a strategy, and if the Imperial Council of Cardinals found it feasible, it would be passed and sent to various departments to formulate specific and feasible decrees.

After the decree was issued, the Imperial Conference of Cardinals broke it down into task objectives and assessment indicators for local religious institutes and issued them out. Local religious institutes then broke it down again and issued it out to priestly institutes.

For example, when I proposed developing agriculture at the beginning of the year, the Imperial Conference of Cardinals felt that it should be completed within three years.

So in the first year, we will develop water conservancy first, and use it as an assessment indicator to send to township associations.

The township religious order proposed to build an irrigation canal for the entire township and issued tasks and indicators to the priestly order.

Then the itinerant friars of the priestly order dismantled it again, and when it came to each centurion, the task became a small section of irrigation canal built by them.

At the end of the year, the Imperial Conference of Cardinals examines the results of local religious orders, local religious orders examine the results of priestly orders, and itinerant friars examine the results of centurions.

In this way, the specific decision-making power, that is, "what to do?" is delegated to the local level, and we are only responsible for deciding "what to do?", which greatly reduces decision-making errors and workload.

If you do things well, you will be promoted. If you do things poorly, you will be demoted.

It's that simple. "

"Your Holiness, your opinion is profound!" After thinking for a while, many high-level officials present nodded one after another.

But amidst the praises, Sissi frowned, for she keenly noticed the most crucial point.

He looked at Catherine beside him, only to find that Catherine was looking at him meaningfully.

Sissi hesitated for a moment, then stood up:
"But Your Majesty, where do the people come from? How do we manage the money?"

(End of this chapter)