796 FINANCIAL REFORM AND THE ECONOMY
rience in Ch'ungch'ong had shown that medicines formerly sent to the capital as
tribute had now been replaced by inferior products available on the market. After
the abolition of required labor service by the professional gatherers of medici-
nal herbs. the work had been taken over by men with no specialized knowledge.
Despite these objections Chief State Councilor Chong T'aehwa ordered Ho
Chok to take responsibility for consulting with Minister of Taxation Chong Yusong
to work out draft regulations for the taedong system for ChOlla and to request
the governor of Ch611a to canvass the views of the magistrates. Even though his
report was not included in the Veritable Records, Kim Yuk, now director of the
Office of the Royal Clan, quoted the governor's report, which he assumed included
false statements. Nonetheless, since it stated that of the fifty-three magistrates
in Ch611a, thirty-four favored the taedong system, sixteen were opposed, and
six were neutral, Kim used it to refute an earlier report that all the district mag-
istrates were opposed to the taedong reform. Han Yongguk found in his research
that opposition to the reform from Left Ch611a Province came almost totally from
the upland region since twenty of the twenty-seven districts in Left Ch611a were
upland while only six of the twenty-three districts of Right ChOlla were upland
and three of these were later reclassified as coastal.
Kim Yuk reported that the residents of the uplands did not want the taedong
system because they estimated their current taxes at the excessively low rate of
ten mal/kyal that reflected the discriminatory shift of taxes to the right province
or coastal region by the government in the past. He insisted that Hyojong take
immediate action on his own authority to lower the tax burden in Left Cholla
and equalize the taxes for the whole province by establishing a uniform taedong
tax rate of ten mal/kyang for the whole province. He urged that five mal be col-
lected before the end of the year and the next portion in the spring, but that after
the fall payment the tax rate could be adjusted, possibly to conform to the rate
in Ch'ungch'ong. Hyojong, however, refused to act without prior discussion with
his ministers.4~
Chances for the extension of the taedong system to Cholla were given an added
boost when Song SiyoL one of King Hyojong's closest confidants, returned from
a trip to ChOlla in 1658, reported that the people favored the taedong reform,
and declared himself that he thought it was "a good law."49 Kim Yuk then rec-
ommended that the taedong system only be adopted in the twenty-seven coastal
districts of ChOlla, and in his last memorial to the king before his death on Octo-
ber 23, he asked Hyojong to appoint his protege, S6 P'ilwon, to the governor-
ship of Ch611a Province to ensure that implementation of reform not be stymied
after his death.
In his laudatory obituary of Kim Yuk, King Hyojong said that in his youth
during King K wanghaegun's regime Kim had been blocked from office because
he was the dcscendant of a colleague ofCho Kwangjo. one Kim Sik. who was
dismissed and banished in 15 19, escaped from exile. and later committed sui-
cide when his whereabouts were revealed. Kim Yuk was first appointed to office