Comments on the Cabinet Ministers' Aspiration to Premier in the Ming Dynasty

The cabinet ministers of the Ming Dynasty were viewed more and more the factual premiers by all the officials in the royal court,not a few of them inevitably supposed that they had been the premiers,some even held the factual power of the premier.This paper tries to demonstrate that the emperor could not absorb premiers' all the functions though Zhu Yuanzhang abolished the position of the premier.In the middle and late Ming Dynasty,the emperor subconsciously thought that the cabinet ministers had been the premiers,in fact,sometimes the ministers were entrusted the power of the premier.This led to the return of the idea of the premier among the bureaucrats.The power of the ministers' gradual rise to that of the premier made the emperor and the other bureaucrats expect that the ministers should have been the premiers.Those who were responsible for the working of the royal court's administration were expected by both the emperor and the other officials to have the power of the premier.Therefore,the ministers' strong aspiration to premier was the natural result of the age and the return of the ministers group's idea about the premier is in reality a natural process of the political trends in the Ming Dynasty.