Liu Yikang - As Prime Minister

As Prime Minister

Liu Yikang was diligent in serving as prime minister for his brother, and particularly because Emperor Wen was often ill, Liu Yikang made many important decisions. The historian Shen Yue, in Song Shu, described Liu Yikang's service as prime minister as such:

Yikang liked executive work, and he was careful in both reading official submissions and examining plans. He took over all matters of the government and made decisions on his own, including matters of life and death. Whatever he opined would be accepted by the emperor, and provincial governors were all commissioned by him. His powers were such that everyone feared him. Yikang himself was also strong and diligent. There would often been hundreds of visitors' wagons outside his mansion each time, and he personally greeted the visitors, no matter how lowlly they were. He was also more intelligent than others with excellent memory, and he remembered all he heard or read for the rest of his life.

Liu Yikang was further described as being very dedicated to Emperor Wen in his illness, spending day and night with his brother. However, he was also described as not having studied enough and been aware that certain actions were inappropriate. He engaged able officials to be his assistants while making the less capable officials serve in other agencies. He also set up a guard corps of 6,000 men without getting prior approval, and did not see that it was inappropriate for him to accept gifts from other officials—gifts that were even more exquisite than the ones Emperor Wen received.

Liu Yikang trusted Liu Dan greatly, and since Liu Dan wanted to replace a trusted advisor of Emperor Wen, Yin Jingren (殷景仁), in importance, he flattered Liu Yikang greatly, causing Liu Yikang to be so arrogant that he was no longer acting toward Emperor Wen as if he were a subject, and Emperor Wen became secretly displeased. (It was also at Liu Dan's urging that Liu Yikang, during Emperor Wen's illness in 436, arrested and executed the famed general Tan Daoji, fearing that if Emperor Wen had died, no one would be able to control Tan.) Once, when Emperor Wen appeared near death, he commissioned Liu Yikang to be the regent for the crown prince Liu Shao. Liu Yikang was very touched by this commission, but Liu Dan instead, along with several other associates of Liu Yikang, including Liu Bin (劉斌), Wang Lü (王履), Liu Jingwen (劉敬文), and Kong Yinxiu (孔胤秀), secretly considered making Liu Yikang emperor against Emperor Wen's wishes. Once Emperor Wen recovered, he received news of this, and he suspected Liu Yikang to be complicit. By the fall of 439, he no longer visited Liu Yikang's mansion—something he often did in the past.

In 440, finally certain that he wanted to remove Liu Yikang, Emperor Wen had his brother put under house arrest, and arrested Liu Dan and several other associates of Liu Yikang and put them to death. He then removed Liu Yikang from his post as prime minister and made him the governor of Jiang Province (江州, modern Jiangxi and Fujian), but put him under close watch by trusted generals, although he permitted Liu Yikang's staff members who were willing to accompany him to go to Jiang Province with him, and supplied him with many things.