Law and Politics in Modern China: Under the Law, the Law, and Abo ...

After a period of time, this imperial title shuffling became redundant as it accomplished little that favoured the throne. No matter how the emperor redefined administrative titles and rankings or reassigned his chief administrators, the imperial intentions almost always clashed with the goals of ambitious officers who were willing to challenge him.

Generations of Chinese rulers adopted a strategy of separation to allow the ruler to maintain authority and strategic control during this power struggle with his officialdom. High-ranking officers were isolated, and each and every one of their legal boundaries were severally limited and interlocked. Judicial barriers between officials were set very high so that the emperor could deal with his challengers individually instead of facing a collection of ministers who could collaborate in order to challenge his authority. During the later Han dynasty, the formal power of the chancellor was replaced by the informal power of the grand commandant. These high-ranking but nominal ministers could be tripped up on some of the many laws, and some were dismissed for the most trivial of offences. From AD 107 onward, the throne intermittently blamed the subversive criticism of administrators on the three excellencies and dismissed several of them.²² In the most serious cases, the ministers who criticised the emperor would be executed or forced to commit suicide.

During the former Han dynasty, relations between the throne and the high officials were relatively smooth. Tensions arose in the middle period, particularly the reign of Emperor Wu (141–87 BC). By the later Han dynasty, the conflicts between the cabinets and the throne intensified as it became obvious that the former appeared to be less willing to be subservient to the latter.²³ After the first fifty years of this dynasty, the high officials were replaced more often and more rapidly.

Despite the wishes of the emperors, the power of the bureaucracy continued to expand, and it became more complex. The evolution of legal and administrative titles of imperial government reflected the history of repeated classification and redefinition of legal jurisdictions and functions, as well as perpetual power redistribution. The title of chancellor (cheng xiang) was in use from the very beginning of the former