Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew proposed drastic changes to the depictions on the $20, $10, and $5 bills. Black abolitionist leader Harriet Tubman would replace slave holding former president Andrew Jackson on the front of the $20 bill, and Jackson would be moved to the back of the $20. "Tubman would be the first woman so honored on paper currency."
Alexander Hamilton will remain on the front of the $10 bill as the father of modern economics, but the back would feature the 1913 march for women's suffrage, including the women's suffrage leaders like Susan B. Antony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Sojourner Truth.
Abraham Lincoln will remain on the front of the $5 bill, and the back of the $5 will show Martin Luther King Jr., Eleanor Roosevelt, and black opera singer Marian Anderson, "who famously snag on steps of the Lincoln Memorial in 1939," in honor of the civil rights movement.
The new designs of the bills will be released in 2020 and will not go into circulation until a decade later.
There is some controversy over these changes considering that Harriet Tubman is replacing Andrew Jackson when she was a slave and he was a slaveholder. Also, some think it is ironic that a former slave is appearing on money when she was once bought with it.
Some women are pushing for more representation of women in prominent places on the bills. Previously, Lew stated that a women would appear on the front of the $10 bill, but it is unclear if that is the plan anymore. Some very successful women wrote a letter to the treasury stating that it would be “a major blow to the advancement of women” if that is not true.
Questions:
What do you think about the new depictions on the proposed currency?
Do you agree that there should be more images of women on the bills?
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/04/20/u-s-to-keep-hamilton-on-front-of-10-bill-put-portrait-of-harriet-tubman-on-20-bill/
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/21/us/women-currency-treasury-harriet-tubman.html?ref=todayspaper
