Local Government
The establishment of military governors in the interior, along with the rise of the salt commissioners, significantly altered Tang administration. The basic principle of early Tang civil government, as under the Han, had been to make local administrative units so small that none could threaten the court.
The largest unit of administration averaged 25,650 households, or 146,800 people. Local officials were directly answerable to the imperial government and had no armed forces at their disposal. Taxes were sent up to the court, which returned only what it thought necessary for local needs. Local officials were barred from serving in their native prefectures, where family ties and personal connections could divide loyalties. They were also regularly transferred to prevent the formation of personal or emotional bonds with their locality. The same restrictions applied to the local officials' immediate subordinates. Their ultimate loyalty was to the court, and a post at court remained their primary object. Indeed, through most of the Tang, even important posts outside the capital were treated as a form of exile.Consequently, continuity in local administration depended on petty subordinate officers who were outside the regular bureaucracy and never rose above their own localities. These men, although nominally low in rank, handled most daily business and were indispensable repositories of local knowledge, local usage, and administrative precedent. Indeed, in many regions the magistrate could not even understand the speech of the people he ruled, so he was totally dependent on his petty officers. Although these clerks were indispensable to local administration, it is unlikely that they represented genuine local interests. Their posts tended to be hereditary, owing to the required literary skills and knowledge of precedent, and their holders consequently often became a small, distinct social group. Dependent on
the magistrate for prestige and power, they did not become the focus for any local ambitions toward autonomy.[1099]