1In the Spring Festival of 927, Liu Xiang hosted a banquet for all the subordinates of 2 1 Military and Political Research Institute. This is Liu Xiang's military and political school imitating Whampoa Military Academy, and the teaching materials are also based on Whampoa teaching materials. On the recommendation of Wang, Liu served as a political history teacher in the institute. Liu is wearing a gown and is the only one who doesn't wear a military uniform. Perhaps for this reason, Liu Xiang sat next to him. When Liu Xiang learned that Liu was a graduate of Peking University's economics department, his eyes lit up and he warmly called him his brother, and invited him to attend the economic conference of Sichuan Supervision Department. Two years later, Liu officially became an important aide to Liu Xiang, and played a key role in a series of military actions to unify Sichuan, which can be described as Liu Xiangzhi's "Xiao He". 1927, Liu Xiang's financial liabilities reached 89 million yuan. 1928, Liu Xiang won the battle with Yang Sen. His territory expanded to 28 counties and his army increased to more than 70,000 people, but he still made ends meet. Therefore, in 1929, Liu Xiang put Liu in charge of finance. Liu took the initiative to make three chapters with Liu Xiang: if Liu engages in malpractices for personal gain, Liu Xiang has the right to shoot him; If Liu and Liu Xiang have major differences of opinion, Liu Xiang has the right to recall him; In addition, Liu is solely responsible for finance, and Liu Xiang shall not order the withdrawal of funds or interfere with his budget execution. At that time, Liu Xiang's subordinates often took Liu Xiang's power of attorney to the financial department for payment, but Liu Xiang often failed to win over his subordinates, making the financial deficit worse. Liu wants to put the rules ahead in case of future trouble.

After Liu became the director of the finance office, he began to implement the policy of accumulating wealth that he proposed to Liu Xiang. "If we still follow the previous methods, we will never be able to raise huge sums of money to expand the army by levying land taxes and compulsory taxes. The fundamental solution is to increase taxes, strive for salt taxes and rectify special taxes. However, when there are still delays, we must follow the example of Nanjing government to issue bonds and convert forward funds into cash to solve urgent needs. At the same time, give priority to the strength of the financial sector and business gangs, and do not have to regard them as the targets of strong factions. " When Liu Yi took office, he streamlined the organization and merged the tax bureau. These tax bureaus are often controlled by Liu Xiang's cronies, subordinates and their relatives and friends, and corruption is rampant, such as plucking geese. When the tax arrives at the inspection office, there is only 60% left. In order to reduce Liu's resistance, Liu Xiang was persuaded to be the general manager of the State Administration of Taxation, but the State Administration of Taxation was managed by Liu's financial department. At Liu's suggestion, Liu Xiang abolished all the more than 30 tax bureaus and merged them into the State Administration of Taxation. Teachers and brigade commanders who had planned to make trouble at the inauguration ceremony of the State Administration of Taxation were depressed when they saw that Liu Xiang was the general manager of the State Administration of Taxation. In the first month after the merger of tax bureaus, the fiscal deficit of 2 1 army was eliminated, with a surplus of1400,000 yuan and a balance of more than 2.7 million yuan in February. Liu told Liu Xiang the whole story and promised that it would not be less than this amount every month. Liu Xiang was overjoyed and used the money to build an arsenal with the latest equipment in Chongqing, which played a decisive role in the battle between Liu Xiang and Liu Wenhui for the dominance of Sichuan.

Later, Liu set his eyes on the salt tax, which, as a national tax, should have been turned over to the state treasury, but in the era of warlord melee, salt tax was a stable and considerable military expenditure for warlords. In Sichuan, Zigong and other salt-producing areas are controlled by Liu, while Chongqing, an important dock for salt transportation and marketing in Sichuan, is in the hands of Liu Xiang. As the representative of 2 1 Army, Liu negotiated with the representative of the 24th Army of Liu and Ning Zhicun. After negotiations, the two armies set up a financial co-ordination office in Chongqing, with Ren as the director, Liu as the deputy director and Ning Zhicun as the chief. Divide the salt tax equally, and each side will get 200 thousand.

Liu also made great efforts on the special tax (opium tax). Liu told the government that heavy taxes could suppress the vitality of the opium market and publicly levied special taxes. Liu invented a new regulation: in areas that produce little or no tobacco soil, no matter whether cigarettes are planted or not, a "mu donation" is levied, which is equivalent to the grain tax of each county for one or two years; In addition, there is a tax on transportation and sales of tobacco soil. All smoky soil that has been taxed can be sold in this province or transported outside the province. Liu even set up a "red light donation" and a "drug addict donation" for tobacco sales terminals. Those who pay the "red light donation" are eligible to open a cigarette shop, and those who pay the "drug addict donation" on a monthly basis can smoke in public, otherwise they will be fined.

For Liu Xiang's subordinates, Liu Ye kept a straight face, ignored all demands for payment, and even tore up Liu Xiang's power of attorney. From then on, Liu Xiang never issued a wanted order for money to his subordinates until his death. In order to cope with Liu Xiang's increasing military expenditure, Liu began to borrow a lot from industry and commerce and finance. Because the warlord "borrowed money" before, the businessman was very wary of the warlord's credit when he never repaid it. Liu called the heads of banks, banks and salt gangs to a meeting and borrowed money from them. Although they didn't want to borrow it, they had to borrow some under pressure, so they were blackmailed. However, after the IOU expired, several people tried to cash it in the finance department. As a result, they not only successfully recovered the loan, but also received Liu's hospitality. Yan Gang is the richest man in Sichuan. For fear of offending Liu Xiang, I dare not cash it. Liu sent someone to ask and personally returned the money. The news that Liu was chasing after paying back the money soon spread, which opened a precedent for borrowing money from the industrial and commercial circles.

One is to support debts with debts and move accounts everywhere to cope with the growing military expenditure. At 193 1, Sichuan became the arena of two warlords, one was Liu Xiang and the other was Liu Xiang. Liu Xiang has more than 100,000 troops, equipped with modern weapons such as warships, planes, cannons and heavy machine guns. He controls dozens of counties in eastern Sichuan and guards the throat of the upper reaches of the Yangtze River. Liu's defense zone has also grown to more than 70 counties, including Xikang, with more than100000 troops. Both of them want to unify Sichuan first, then dominate the southwest, and even win the Central Plains. At this time, Liu has been unable to meet the military expenditure through taxation and borrowing, so he is going to turn forward currency into cash. Liu, together with Yang Meili, chairman of Juxingcheng Bank, Kang, general manager of meifeng Bank, and Wu Shoutong, chairman of Sichuan Salt Bank, issued a large number of government bonds and treasury bills, and set up a stock exchange in Chongqing, imitating Shanghai and running Shenhui. These measures made Liu Xiang obviously superior to Liu in military strength, which became the main reason for Liu Xiang's final victory in the "two Liu wars". From 1932 to 1933, when the war ended and Liu retreated to Xikang, 2 1 Army issued ten national bonds with a total amount of 41300,000 yuan. The "26 th Battle" was the largest and last battle of Sichuan warlords in more than 20 years. On the one hand, the reunification of Sichuan made politics tend to be on the right track, and the people were able to recuperate and build a solid rear for the later all-round war of resistance. On the other hand, the people of Sichuan suffered greatly from the war.

Before the "Two Liu Wars", Liu also traveled between Nanjing and Chongqing as the special envoy of Liu Xiang, showing kindness to Chiang Kai-shek and gaining the support of the central government. During this period, Liu was able to get to know Chiang Kai-shek and Liu's plan to rectify Sichuan's finances, which was deeply appreciated by them. Because Liu offended Liu Xiang's strategist Liu, and had close contacts with Wang, the queen came to garrison Wanxian County to guard the main waterway transportation routes, and Liu Xiang was afraid of collusion between Wang and Liu and heresy; Suspected by Liu Xiang, Liu Xiang felt that Liu Chenhang's words were big and boastful, with ulterior motives and difficult to control. Therefore, Liu Xiang reported to the Central Committee that the candidate for Sichuan Provincial Finance Director was not Liu, but Tang Di, Liu Xiang's confidant. Under the intervention of the government, Liu squeezed out Tang Di and became the first financial director of Sichuan. 1935 In February, the Sichuan Provincial Government of the Kuomintang was established in Chongqing, with Liu Xiangren as chairman and Liu concurrently as finance. Before Liu became the finance director, he made a plan to rectify Sichuan's finance. Before he returned to Sichuan as the appointed financial director, he copied the Plan to Shanghai Shenbao and published it under the title of Liu Tan, the new financial director of Sichuan, sorting out Sichuan's financial plan.

The newly established provincial government urgently needs to solve the financial problem of compiling the annual budget for June 65438-June 1936. This budget needs nearly 70 million yuan according to the province's expenditure and the number of loans received in February-May after the establishment of the provincial government. By the first half of 1936, the annual budget for July-June of1937 was compiled and the expenditure was about 80 million yuan. During Liu's tenure, it is not easy to solve such a huge financial expenditure. He did the same thing again, rectifying taxes and levying new taxes. Measures such as expanding credit and withdrawing funds have greatly increased the burden on the people.

(1) Rectify land taxes. In order to increase the income of land tax, Liu made a plan to rectify land tax, and cleared up the land area again, which made the land area of each county generally increase. The grain of counties in Sichuan is more than 602,000. After the revolution of 1911, it was converted into silver dollars, about one or two per grain, and converted into more than ten yuan, with a total annual income of more than 7 million. This was originally a levy once a year, and Liu tripled the so-called temporary "deficit suppression" funds, but in fact it became a levy four times a year, which aggravated the exploitation of farmers.

(two) to clean up the land sale and pawn tax. In the past, taxes were levied on the sale and pawn of land, and the collection units in different counties were inconsistent. In order to unify the tax rate, the deed tax is changed to more than 0/0% of the lease price per hundred yuan/kloc, and a few percent of the deed tax per hundred yuan. Such a change. Two kinds of deed taxes can be levied1more than 10,000 yuan a year.

(3) Quanchuan Inspection Deed Paper. When Liu was in charge of the finance of the 21st Army, he had checked the title deeds of the counties in the defense zone. Each deed is charged 1 yuan, and 50 points are paid for small deeds. White deed tax, late acceptance fine. Each deed must be stamped separately, robbing many people of their fat. Now, his taxes are increasing. It is declared that all the deed papers printed in the past defense zones are completely invalid, and it is legal and effective to replace them with the deed papers sealed by the Kuomintang Sichuan Provincial Government. It was implemented in the second half of 1936. When each deed paper is checked and replaced, the charge for the deed above 100 yuan is 3 yuan, and the charge for the deed below 100 yuan is 1 50 yuan, and the charge for the pawn deed is halved. In a certain period of time, those who have been inspected and replaced by the tax collection authorities, whether they are red deeds or white deeds, should be inspected and replaced, and white deeds will not be punished. This method has achieved practical results, especially by cheating out all the old white deeds and replacing them after paying taxes without punishment. Although the income from each deed is small, it is more than twice the budget, reaching as much as150,000 yuan.

(four) increase the slaughter tax surcharge. Slaughter taxes in counties and cities in Sichuan were originally earmarked for education. In addition to the regular tax, Liu adds 2 yuan to each pig. If about four or five million pigs are killed every year, it will be about100000 yuan.

(five) the implementation of a tax system for goods. Cross-cutting in Sichuan under the guise of abolishing exorbitant taxes and miscellaneous fees; Export goods are taxed only once. Pass by ticket, no need to pay taxes. The tax system has simplified procedures and avoided extortion by some tax collectors, but the burden on the people has not been reduced. The tax rate is 100%, which is about 8 million yuan for the whole year.

(6) Continue to levy a smoking tax. This tax is generally divided into two areas: one is a tobacco growing area and the other is a non-tobacco growing area. People who eat cigarettes in both areas should accept red light donations, and smoking areas should be provided with cigarette nests. Import and export cigarettes are taxed. For example, Yunnan-Guizhou cigarettes are transported to Sichuan or from Sichuan to other provinces. There is a "General Administration of Smoking Prohibition" in Sichuan Province, and there are "Supervision Offices for Smoking Prohibition" in all counties, which are in charge of the types, transportation, sale and smoking of tobacco soil. Chongqing has also been practicing "unified collection and marketing" for some time. The budget tax for smoking ban in Liu is only a few million yuan, which is actually several times more.

(7) Levy business tax. This business tax started on 1936. In urban market towns, all kinds of shops levy a tax rate of 3% according to their turnover. Designated by the national government as provincial local income. The provincial government has also formulated business tax collection regulations and implementation rules, which are distributed to all counties for implementation. Although great difficulties occurred in the early days, some counties also caused a wave of strikes by businessmen. The provincial government has a large tax revenue, and the tax source is normal, instructing the county magistrate to implement it. If it doesn't work, only the county magistrate will ask questions and use administrative pressure to implement it.

(8) Reorganizing and establishing provincial banks, recovering local currency and issuing supplementary currency. After the establishment of the provincial government, Liu reorganized Sichuan Local Bank into Sichuan Provincial Bank, with an increase of 800,000 yuan and a capital of 2 million yuan, and concurrently served as the general manager. At that time, Sichuan was in financial difficulties and had no money to increase capital, so Liu played a trick of "hanging an umbrella in the air". In the name of the director of finance, he ordered the provincial bank to set up two one-month promissory notes, each with an amount of 400,000 yuan, and handed them to Chongqing meifeng Bank and Chuankang Bank with 400,000 yuan each, as the capital increase allocated by the provincial government to the provincial bank. Less than a month later, the finance department borrowed 800,000 yuan from the provincial bank with the face value of 6.5438+0.4 million yuan, and the provincial bank paid 800,000 yuan to the spot promissory note, which was used by the finance department to repay the loans of Meifeng and Chuankang respectively, and the one-month promissory note originally made by the provincial bank was returned to the provincial bank. At the same time, the finance department borrowed 580,000 yuan from the provincial bank with 950,000 yuan of Sichuan Construction Bond. In this way, when Sichuan local bank was restructured into Sichuan provincial bank, the financial department was asked to increase its capital by 800,000 yuan, and the actual financial department borrowed 580,000 yuan. This is one of Liu's usual methods to expand credit and raise funds.

After Liu was appointed as the general manager of the provincial bank, the first problem he faced was to recover the banknotes. Sichuan Provincial Local Bank was established in 1934. In order to meet the needs of Liu Xiang's military expenditure, the "Sichuan Local Bank Exchange Voucher" was issued at the beginning. The face value is 1 yuan, 5 yuan, 10 yuan. As of April 9, 1935, the issued banknotes reached more than 33 million yuan, while the cash reserve was only more than 3 million yuan, less than110. As a result, cash is getting more and more expensive and paper money is getting cheaper. Every 1000 banknotes are converted into cash, and the water needs to be replenished to 60 or 70 yuan. This has led to serious road running in Chongqing, Chengdu and other places, and even many accidents of crowding and trampling people to death. People's hearts are floating and it is difficult to calm down. As the director of finance, Liu invited people from Chongqing financial circles to discuss, and decided to hand over all bank and rural banknotes to the "Sichuan local bank exchange voucher reserve" as much as possible, organize a "settlement Committee" and issue a "settlement certificate". This credit card can be used in the market, and it can be replaced once every half month and at the end of the month. The bonus due in half month is attached to it. The sub-fund shall be undertaken by the Finance Department and owned by the witness. If the interest rate is determined, the first day before half a month and the first day at the end of the month will be decided by the "settlement Committee". After the implementation of this law, banks and villages in Chongqing sealed up 7 million yuan of banknotes. Although the amount of banknotes issued is more than 30 million, Sichuan Province has a vast territory, most of which are from other counties. Chongqing sealed more than 7 million useless, the market chips decreased, and the wind of bank runs eased. At the same time, a special car was sent to Chengdu to help, and the trend temporarily subsided. On the other hand, he turned to Chiang Kai-shek. Chiang Kai-shek's central ruling power extended to Sichuan, set up a "chairman's camp" in Chengdu, implemented its legal tender policy, and returned the right to issue banknotes to the central government. After several plans, it was explicitly announced by Hangying on September 5 1935 that the paper money would be recycled and sold at a 20% discount as "central paper money", which caused great losses to the people of Sichuan.

However, Liu asked the Ministry of Finance to issue 50-cent coins by Sichuan Bank before1October 20th 1936+065438 converted all local banknotes into central banknotes. Sichuan Bank signed contracts with local banks and banks to collect tokens to expand its issuance. According to the book records of Sichuan Bank in June 1937, the actual issuance amount was 9.983 million yuan, which has reached the saturation point and was ordered to stop issuing in the future. Tokens have poor paper quality and are easily damaged. In the process of circulation, a large number of losses have not been recovered, which has caused people to suffer another disaster.

Liu's ambition to issue paper money is not limited to this. Due to the restrictions of the issuance regulations, he may not only issue tokens. On the contrary, in addition to printing 50-cent tokens in large quantities, 5 yuan and 10 yuan banknotes were also printed in large quantities, with the amount exceeding 1 100 million yuan. However, due to the financial regulations of the national government, this kind of paper money was not issued. Then, War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression broke out, Liu Xiang died in Hankou, and Liu's finance director collapsed. He gave the printed banknotes as a gift to Song Ziwen, and said in a flattering tone: War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression needs a lot of military expenditure, so it is imperative to issue more banknotes. As long as the words Sichuan Bank are erased and stamped with the seal of the Ministry of Finance or the central bank, paper money printed in the name of the provincial bank can be issued. Song accepted and implemented it, which increased some chips for the flood and devaluation of paper money.

(9) Issuing government bonds. During his tenure as Finance Director, Liu also issued "24-year Sichuan Rehabilitation Bond", "25-year Sichuan Treasury Bond", "25-year Sichuan Rehabilitation Bond" and "25-year Sichuan Construction Repayment Bond" with a total amount of 65.438+45 billion yuan. When issuing such a large number of bonds, Liu still adopts the old method, taking banks and banks as the main targets of promoting bonds, giving different interest and selling them at 60% or 30% of the face value.

(10) Collect and redeem profitable promissory notes. After Liu became the chief financial officer, he took over as the director of Chongqing Anti-smoking Bureau. Implement "unified mining and marketing" for tobacco soil, and let the government monopolize patents. At that time, Chongqing Unified Taxation Office formed the "Li Ji Consortium" (Sichuan Salt Bank and Meifeng Bank have the largest share capital, so Wu Shoutong, the chairman of Sichuan Salt Bank, and Kang Xinru, the general manager of Meifeng Bank, respectively served as the general manager and assistant manager of the consortium), and raised 5 million yuan as acquisition funds. When the cash is insufficient, a promissory note will be issued to purchase the inventory of tobacco dealers, and then the purchased tobacco soil will be distributed to the county non-smoking sub-bureaus. Due to the backlog of inventory, the unified ticket collection can't be sold, and the tobacco dealers have a lot of tobacco soil, which can't be solved. The cigarette money sent to the county non-smoking sub-bureau could not be collected, which affected the maturity of the "Li Ji" promissory note. However, most of the "Li Ji" promissory notes were discounted by salt merchants to Chongqing financial circles and could not be cashed as scheduled. Only bank positions have accumulated more than 20 million yuan, which has caused the market to be extremely nervous. At that time, Wu Shoutong and Kang Xinru fell out with Tang Hua for this matter, blaming each other and yelling at each other. When Liu was present, he immediately pretended to be concerned and tried his best to solve this matter, saying, "Take all the outstanding promissory notes and give them to me, and exchange them for the financial department's promissory notes to recognize the profits of two points. I sold the stock in the centralized collection office to repay it. In doing so, he ostensibly transferred the "burden" to the financial department and made the money in the market active. In fact, he took the opportunity to grab the money to save Sichuan's financial difficulties at that time.

In addition, in order to cultivate a group of cronies and develop grass-roots strength, Liu started a "financial training class" in the first half of 1935, with Liu Xiang as the head teacher and deputy director. Three issues were held, each ranging from March to May. After graduation, these people were transferred to tax authorities all over the province, and some of them served as tax collection directors, holding the fiscal revenue of all localities.

On the whole, due to the breaking of the system of Sichuan warlord reserve, the military, politics and finance are basically unified. During Liu's tenure as finance director, due to the exploitation of the people's wealth in many ways, Sichuan's financial difficulties were reversed, and the balance of payments and surplus were indeed realized. The first task of Chiang Kai-shek's sending a staff committee into Sichuan is to unify and reorganize the Sichuan army. It is said that there were still as many as 270 or 80 regiments after all the troops in Sichuan verified their establishment at that time. After the reorganization, the commanders of the various armies will still command in name only, pay salaries, and stop sending more troops, thus blocking the way for the armies to expand at will. Liu Xiang has far more troops than other armies. But his ambition is immortal, and he has to use the military, political and financial power to secretly develop the army and constantly expand his own strength. Liu Xiang will add several regiments to the original troops, and discuss with Liu, asking him to find a way financially, and put forward that it will cost about 20 million to buy weapons. Liu strongly expressed his willingness to be loyal, patting his chest and saying, "Fugong (that is, Liu Xiang) has done a good job, and I am fully responsible for the finances."

1937 before War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression, Liu Xiang strengthened and expanded two divisions. The teacher of one division is Liu Shucheng, and the teacher of the other division is Liu Xiang's brother-in-law Zhou Xiaolan. Liu Xiang regarded these two divisions as his most loyal troops. Liu Shucheng was stationed in Qionglai and Dayi, the hometown of Liu Xiang. Zhou Xiaolan is stationed in Yibin, Liu's hometown. Judging from the garrison arrangement, it has its profound meaning. The excellent equipment and military pay expanded by these two divisions are allocated by the Provincial Department of Finance. 1938 1 month, after Liu Xiang's death, Liu still remitted 1 10,000 to 30,000 yuan to the Second Division every month at the request of his widow Liu as the activity expenses. This remittance was remitted by Liu Limo to Chuankang or Chuanyan for remittance. Soon, Wang Zuxu became the chairman of the Sichuan provincial government, and Wang He had a conflict with Liu. He ordered the arrest of Liu on the pretext of thoroughly examining the accounts of the finance department. Liu left Hong Kong in May and stopped remittance.