Emperor Ch’ien-lung had used the term “Ch’ien-kang tu-lan” 乾綱獨攬 (sovereign power should be grasped solely by the emperor) so often to justify his autocratic rule that the term has now become a common label to denote the autocracy of the Ch’ien-lung era by modem scholars. It is important to note that both the term itself and the Emperor’ s concepts of sovereign power were inherited from his grandfather Emperor K’ang-hsi and his father Emperor Yung-cheng, who had already used similar terms such as “ch’ien-kang tu- yü” 乾綱獨御 (sovereign power should only be exercised by the emperor), and “ch’ ien-kang tu-tuan” 乾綱獨斷 (state affairs should only be decided by the emperor) as their slogans. Emperor K’ang-hsi was the first Ch'ing emperor who gave a clear and thorough account of his role and responsibility as an emperor. He strongly identified himself as the ruler of China and loved to constantly remind his subjects the same. Emperor K’ang-his’s ideas of himself being the supreme sovereign were formulated during the second and third decades of his reign. Since then, he did not tolerate any slight challenge to his sovereignty from any subjects including his crown prince. In order to uphold his sovereignty, he even deposed his crown prince and refused to appoint a new one. Emperor Yung-cheng modeled his mode of rule after his father’s and justified his own autocratic rule by his father’ s as well. With a vision of demonstrating his almightiness as befitting a supreme sovereign, he boasted that he was at once able to perform the duties for his grand-secretaries, to manage the family affairs for his bannerman officials, and to handle those government businesses, that even the officials of the Six Ministries and the Censorate found hard or impossible to tackle.