Jacob J. Lew, the Secretary of the Treasury, recently released a landmark proposal to redesign the twenty dollar bill, most notably by replacing the portraiture of Andrew Jackson with that of Harriet Tubman. Though Andrew Jackson was hailed as a war hero and served as the seventh U.S. president, he was also a slaveholder and persecutor of Native Americans.
Tubman, by contrast, was an abolitionist and civil rights leader, and the key proponent of Lew’s proposition was to redesign the currency to celebrate such figures as well as “bring to life” the national monuments currently depicted on the back. The 5 and 10 dollar bills will also likely be transformed, but Abraham Lincoln and Alexander Hamilton will remain on the notes. However, according to Lew’s design, Hamilton would be accompanied by images of suffragettes Lucretia Mott, Sojourner Truth, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Alice Paul and Susan B. Anthony. Images of Marian Anderson, Eleanor Roosevelt and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. will also be added to the 5 dollar note.
The definitive new designs will be released in 2020, but the progress and initiative taken to honor an ever-growing number of social justice leaders will surely prove to be worth the wait.