Fair Fraud and Fraudulent Fairness: The 1761 Examination Case

Abstract

Fair Fraud and Fraudulent Fairness: The 1761 Examination Case * Iona D. Man-Cheong (bio) State-sponsored examinations, the mainstay of the Qing and the previous Ming state’s recruitment policy, were the preferred mode of training members of the educated elite. Just before the 1761 metropolitan examination, a provincial censor, Sui Chaodong, working temporarily in the Grand Council, the emperor’s closest and most important advisory body, submitted a memorial requesting the revival of “avoidance” examinations, special sittings for those who, because of a conflict of interest, were disqualified from taking the regular civil service examinations. 1 Instead of treating this as a routine matter, the Qianlong emperor reacted with rage. He instigated a thorough-going investigation, and Sui was subsequently condemned to death. In a follow-up decision, the top-ranked candidate, Zhao Yi, was demoted to third place. While Zhao Yi was not implicated directly in the avoidance investigation, his fate was certainly an effect of it. [End Page 51] This article explores the multiple implications of this 1761 examination avoidance case to expose the tensions between the state and elite office-holding families, and within the state itself—that is, between the throne and its administrative agencies. My analysis will show that because the metropolitan examination—the highest in the three-tiered system—interpenetrated and interconnected various social and political spheres of elite power, it could be an effective instrument for furthering networks of connection and influence. These networks crossed social and political boundaries, creating a complex terrain that obliged both emperor and officials alike to negotiate. Avoidance (huibi) referred to the act of avoiding situations caused by a conflict of interest between the state and the family, or, in other words, between public and private. Avoidance also referred to the laws and regulations established to adjudicate any conflict arising from such eventualities; on the whole, these regulations were supposed to prevent connections inimical to state interests. In part one, I discuss avoidance examinations and avoidance laws; part two follows the political consequences of Sui Chaodong’s request; the third part describes the repercussions for Zhao Yi. “Connection” connects all three parts. In the first instance, I lay out the issue of holding special examinations for sons and relatives of office-holding families who were otherwise disqualified by family connection. The Qianlong emperor, having later abolished these special examinations, discovered that many of his officials would rather use their privileged positions to further family fortunes and in the long run possibly damage the integrity of that recruitment process. At the same time as the emperor was discovering how family connection worked, he also began to suspect that fostering family connection within the Grand Council might be used to create political obligations threatening favoritism or, even worse, factionalism. Political connection is thus the second type of connection discussed. Finally, I talk about Zhao Yi’s personal connections and the struggle of the candidate and the emperor to each achieve different goals: one trying desperately to achieve the family-mandated goals of status and success in career and state service; the other choosing to make a pointed demonstration of the dominance of imperial power over the imperially-perceived pretensions of the Grand Council. The success of one, as it turns out, was felt to deny the success of the other. As my title suggests, the emperor and Zhao Yi each assumed a different definition of “fair,” while the results themselves demonstrated the obdurate nature of systemic dynamics. Avoidance Examinations and Examination Avoidance Law Officials, whether from moral imperatives of filial piety or material ones of status maintenance, were very much under pressure to foster the careers [End Page 52] of their junior relatives. Examination avoidance laws, to the contrary, were designed to prevent office-holding families from abusing their supervisory responsibilities in the examinations by helping their junior relatives towards examination qualification, and by bringing undue influence to bear where they could. Although the yin inheritance of office privilege allowed some officeholders’ families to bypass the whole examination system, and thus the problem of examination avoidance, by the eighteenth century it was limited in scope and decidedly lacking in prestige. 2 Without avoidance examinations, one simple solution was explained...