Why Scholar-Officials Could Not Defeat the Eunuch Network

Scholar-officials kept fighting back, but they faced not just a few eunuchs; they faced an entire palace power network.

After Dou Wu and Chen Fan tried to destroy eunuch power, the palace struck first. The second Partisan Prohibition shattered the scholar-official world, but some men still refused to bow.

Emperor Ling Grew Up

In 171, Emperor Ling held his coming-of-age ceremony and issued the usual general amnesty.

But under repeated eunuch advice, partisans had become unforgivable in his mind. An amnesty could exist. The partisans could not be pardoned.

At the same time, he remembered that Empress Dowager Dou had helped bring him to Luoyang as emperor.

After Dou Wu's failure, she had been confined in the Southern Palace. Once Emperor Ling came of age, he led civil and military officials there to pay respects and personally celebrated her birthday.

Some officials also spoke for her, arguing that Dou Wu had planned against eunuchs and that the empress dowager might not have known the details. If she had not restrained him, they said, the eunuchs might already have been killed.

Emperor Ling improved her treatment.

This made Cao Jie, Wang Fu, and the other eunuchs deeply uneasy. If Empress Dowager Dou recovered influence, the Dou Wu case might be reversed, and they would be the ones judged.

Anyone who spoke for the empress dowager soon came under attack.

The Quarrel Over Her Burial

Empress Dowager Dou was not old, but she had lost freedom for years and then suffered her mother's death. She soon fell ill and died.

The eunuchs hated the Dou family so much that even death did not end the struggle. They moved her body into Luoyang, left it there for days, and wanted to bury her with the rites of a consort rather than an empress dowager.

This time Emperor Ling did not completely lose judgment. He insisted on funeral rites for an empress dowager.

The eunuchs then tried another angle. By rule, Empress Dowager Dou should be buried with the late emperor. Cao Jie and Wang Fu wanted to choose another burial place and move Consort Feng to share the former emperor's tomb instead.

Emperor Ling gathered the Three Excellencies and Nine Ministers to discuss it and ordered the palace attendant Zhao Zhong to supervise.

Hundreds of officials looked at one another and hesitated. Grand Commandant Li Xian came despite illness and told his family before leaving that if the empress dowager could not share sacrifice with the former emperor, he would not return alive.

Zhao Zhong pressed the officials to speak.

Chen Qiu, Chamberlain for Law Enforcement, stood first. Empress Dowager Dou had held the title, governed the empire, and should share worship with the former emperor. Zhao Zhong ordered him to draft the proposal, and Chen Qiu wrote it on the spot.

Zhao Zhong's face changed with anger. Chen Qiu said that Chen Fan and Dou Wu had been wronged, Empress Dowager Dou had been confined without reason, and the whole empire resented it. Since he had spoken, he would not regret it even if his head and body were separated after the meeting.

Li Xian agreed. Empress Dowager Dou had enthroned the emperor and treated him as a son. How could the emperor refuse to treat her as mother?

Emperor Ling accepted their view. Empress Dowager Dou was buried with full rites beside the former emperor.

Words on the Vermilion Bird Gate

The argument enraged the eunuchs. They had killed so many people, yet some officials still dared speak for the Dou family.

Soon a line of writing appeared on the Vermilion Bird Gate of the Luoyang palace. Its meaning was blunt: the realm was in chaos; Cao Jie and Wang Fu had confined and harmed the empress dowager; the Three Excellencies and Nine Ministers drew salaries but did not dare speak loyal words.

Emperor Ling was furious and ordered Liu Meng, the capital inspector, to investigate.

The eunuchs wanted to expand the case. Liu Meng believed the writing stated the truth and refused to search aggressively. More than a month passed with no culprit found.

The eunuchs were dissatisfied. Liu Meng was demoted, and Duan Jiong replaced him.

Duan Jiong attached himself to the eunuchs and immediately made sweeping arrests, including students studying at the Imperial University. More than one thousand people were imprisoned. Liu Meng himself was impeached and sentenced to penal labor.

The eunuchs had used the graffiti to clear away more enemies.

The King of Bohai Died

By now, even princes were unsafe.

Liu Kui, King of Bohai, was Emperor Huan's younger brother and had once been demoted for misconduct. Earlier he had asked the palace attendant Wang Fu to speak for him, promising fifty million cash if his kingdom was restored.

Emperor Huan's final edict restored Liu Kui's kingdom. Liu Kui knew this was not Wang Fu's achievement and refused to pay.

Wang Fu held the grudge.

He falsely accused Liu Kui of associating with palace attendants and plotting rebellion. Others then claimed those attendants planned to enthrone the King of Bohai.

Emperor Ling was not close to Liu Kui. When he heard the word rebellion, he ordered the arrest.

Liu Kui was forced to kill himself. His consorts, children, singers, dancers, and dozens of people died in prison. Officials of the kingdom were also executed.

Wang Fu and eleven other eunuchs, however, were made marquises for exposing the supposed great treason.

From then on, Cao Jie and Wang Fu grew even stronger. If a prince offended eunuchs, he too could be destroyed.

Cao Luan Expanded the Prohibition

Even so, some officials still spoke for the partisans.

In 176, Cao Luan, governor of Yongchang, submitted a memorial asking that the partisans be rehabilitated.

Emperor Ling and the eunuchs were furious. Cao Luan was arrested, brought to Luoyang in a prison cart, tortured, and killed.

The court then reopened investigations into students, followers, former officials, and subordinates of the partisans. Fathers, sons, and brothers of partisans who held office were dismissed and barred forever.

Later, the prohibition expanded to relatives within the five degrees of mourning.

The second prohibition continued spreading outward.

Cai Yong Offered Advice

In 178, strange omens, earthquakes, and eclipses shook the court. Emperor Ling became afraid and asked ministers for the cause.

Cai Yong, a learned official, replied that disasters were connected to government. The emperor had once trusted his wet nurse, and now he favored eunuchs, while upright ministers were pushed away. If wicked men were not removed, the court would not be peaceful.

Cai Yong warned that these words must not reach eunuchs, or more ministers would suffer.

Emperor Ling read the memorial and sighed. But when he got up and left, Cao Jie secretly saw the text and leaked it.

Everyone Cai Yong had criticized hated him. Soon accusations were assembled to kill him.

The palace attendant Lu Qiang, more upright than most eunuchs, defended Cai Yong. He was spared death, but he and his family were shaved as criminals and exiled to Shuofang. Assassins were even sent on the road, though one was moved by Cai Yong's integrity and did not strike.

Yang Qiu Made His Move

Cao Jie, Wang Fu, and their networks now spread inside and outside the court.

Wang Fu's father, brothers, adopted son, nephews, and relatives held posts as high ministers, commandants, inspectors, governors, and county magistrates. They abused power locally.

His adopted son Wang Ji, chancellor of Pei Kingdom, was especially cruel. When he executed people, he cut their bodies apart, loaded them into prison carts, attached written charges, and displayed them through the counties. In summer, when bodies rotted, he strung bones together and continued the display.

The people were terrified.

Then Yang Qiu became Colonel Director of Retainers.

Wang Fu's men had seized more than seventy million cash of public property in the Jingzhao region. Someone reported it. Wang Fu was on leave, and Duan Jiong was also at home after a solar eclipse.

Yang Qiu seized the chance to enter the palace and accuse Wang Fu, Duan Jiong, and others before the emperor.

Emperor Ling usually heard only voices filtered through eunuchs. This time Wang Fu was not beside him. Yang Qiu's words reached the throne, and the edict came quickly.

Wang Fu, Duan Jiong, Wang Fu's adopted son Wang Meng, Wang Ji, and others were arrested and placed in Luoyang prison.

Yang Qiu personally interrogated Wang Fu and used severe torture. Wang Meng, who had once held Yang Qiu's office, tried to plead through shared rank. Yang Qiu ignored him.

Wang Fu and his son were beaten to death. Duan Jiong was forced to kill himself.

Yang Qiu then copied Wang Ji's own cruelty. He cut Wang Fu's body apart and displayed it at the city gate market, posting that he was a treacherous minister. Wang Fu's property was confiscated, and his family exiled.

For a moment, powerful families held their breath. Cao Jie and others did not dare leave the palace on rest days.

Cao Jie Struck Back

Yang Qiu did not intend to stop with Wang Fu. He planned to move against Cao Jie and other eunuchs, as well as lawless great families.

Soon a consort of the former emperor died, and officials went out for the funeral. Cao Jie left the palace with them. On the road, he saw Wang Fu's mutilated body and wept to his allies.

Fighting among themselves was one thing, he said. How could outsiders be allowed to humiliate eunuchs like this?

Cao Jie and the others returned to the palace and told Emperor Ling that Yang Qiu was merely a brutal legal official and should no longer serve as capital inspector.

Emperor Ling listened again. He transferred Yang Qiu to another post.

Yang Qiu was away inspecting imperial tombs. The Secretariat urgently summoned him to receive the order. Yang Qiu begged to see the emperor, knocked his head until it bled, and asked for one more month to deal with the wolves in court.

The eunuchs on the hall shouted at him for resisting the edict.

Yang Qiu had no choice but to accept. The plan to remove the eunuchs could not continue.

Another Failure

Cao Jie and the eunuchs recovered strength. Even the upright eunuch Lu Qiang could not bear it.

When Emperor Ling wanted to make Lu Qiang a marquis, Lu Qiang refused firmly. He submitted that Emperor Gaozu's old rule forbade marquis titles without real merit. Eunuchs had committed so many crimes that Heaven and the people were angry. Cai Yong had spoken truth and was persecuted; after that, ministers would fear giving honest advice.

Emperor Ling knew Lu Qiang was loyal, but he did not change course.

Former law minister Chen Qiu then urged Minister over the Masses Liu He to recommend Yang Qiu back to the capital inspector's post and arrest Cao Jie and the others one by one.

Liu He hesitated, afraid that eunuch eyes and ears were everywhere. Secretariat official Liu Na scolded him for cowardice, and Liu He finally agreed to plot with Yang Qiu.

Disaster came from inside. Yang Qiu had a concubine who was the daughter of a eunuch. She told her father, and the news reached Cao Jie.

Cao Jie moved first. He falsely accused Liu He, Liu Na, Yang Qiu, and Chen Qiu of private collusion and plotting. Emperor Ling hated ministerial factions and became furious.

All of them were imprisoned and executed.

Scholar-officials had fought back again and again: memorials, court arguments, legal attacks, even the killing of Wang Fu. None could truly defeat the eunuch network.

Emperor Ling still trusted eunuchs and still hated the partisans. The next question is what this confused emperor himself would do to the dynasty.