Case of Wei Shu of Jin Assembling Feudal Lords' Ministers to Fortify Chengzhou, with Zhong Ji of Song Refusing the Labor Assignment, and Jin's Detention of Zhong Ji to the Capital

In 509 BC, Wei Shu, the chief minister of the Jin state, convened ministers of various feudal states to construct and fortify the walls of Chengzhou, the capital of the Eastern Zhou king. When the labor tasks were distributed, Zhong Ji of Song refused to accept his assigned work, arguing that Song, as descendants of the Shang dynasty, was not subject to the same labor obligations. Wei Shu, asserting his authority as leader of the alliance and enforcer of the Zhou king's orders, deemed this a defiance of royal command and dereliction of duty. Jin forces thereupon arrested Zhong Ji and forcibly escorted him to the Zhou capital to be dealt with by the royal court. The incident highlights the enforcement of corvée obligations through hegemonic power in the Spring and Autumn period.

Zhong Ji was arrested and delivered to the Zhou royal capital under escort. The historical record does not detail his final punishment, but the act itself constituted the enforcement: Jin exercised power to compel compliance and handed him over to the symbolic judgment of the Zhou king.

Whether Zhong Ji was legitimately obligated to perform the corvée labor demanded by the Jin-led alliance, and whether Jin had the authority to unilaterally arrest and extradite a serving minister of a sovereign state for refusing the assignment.

This case exemplified the Jin state's dominance and its role as hegemon in compelling other states to fulfill obligations toward the Zhou king through force. It deepened resentment among smaller states and underscored the tension between ritual propriety and coercion. In later scholarship, the incident became a frequently cited example in discourses on the conflict between hegemonic power and feudal rites, and on the limits of interstate jurisdiction in the pre-imperial Chinese world.