Middle Reign
In 178, Emperor Ling carried out a plan that greatly damaged the authority of the imperial government and harmed the people even more—he sold offices of all kinds for money. The people who purchased these offices would then become extremely corrupt while in office—and in fact, that was what Emperor Ling contemplated, for he allowed people who did not have the money to start to set up installment payment plans after they were placed in office.
In 180, Emperor Ling created Consort He as the new empress and made her brother He Jin a key official in his government. (According to legends, she was initially selected as an imperial consort because her family bribed the eunuchs.) She received the empress position because she had given birth to Emperor Ling's son Liu Bian (劉辯).
During these years, Emperor Ling became interested in heavy spending to build imperial gardens, and to finance them he ordered the commanderies and principalities to offer tributes to him personally. This in turn created pressures for officials to be corrupt. However, he also did listen to good advice at times, but did not follow them consistently. For the more honest of his officials, it became a frustrating exercise to try to persuade Emperor Ling on points that were beneficial to the people—because he was in fact persuadable but not usually so.
Read more about this topic: Emperor Ling Of Han
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