Harriet Tubman to Replace Andrew Jackson on $20 Bill

[nuckles87]

Nuvendil said:

nuckles87 said:

The point I was making was that slavery wasn't really the reason. He was specifically targeted by groups who wanted a woman on the $20 because of his role in the Trails of Tears, not because of slave ownership.

I would guess the article called Jackson a slaveholder to easily draw a stark comparison between her and Jackson, but I've not heard anyone who's actually been trying to get this done for the past year cite it.

Well this has been going on for longer than a year really, Indians have been upset over it for a long time.  Many Indian tribes won't take $20 bills.  But what I don't get is why they went with Tubman as opposed to Martin Luther King Jr, the face and leader of the best of the Civil Rights Movement.  But then, like I already said, I overall find this a silly waste of time and effort that could be more productively applied for elsewhere.

...I was referring to this: http://www.womenon20s.org/

This is a group that wanted a woman on money. They chose the 20 because:

"1. Andrew Jackson was celebrated for his military prowess, for founding the Democratic party and for his simpatico with the common man. But as the seventh president of the United States, he also helped gain Congressional passage of the "Indian Removal Act of 1830" that drove Native American tribes of the Southeastern United States off their resource-rich land and into Oklahoma to make room for white European settlers. Commonly known as the Trail of Tears, the mass relocation of Indians resulted in the deaths of thousands from exposure, disease and starvation during the westward migration. Not okay.

2. Some argue that because Jackson was a fierce opponent of the central banking system and favored gold and silver coin or "hard money" over paper currency, he is an ironic choice for immortalization on our money."

FYI, that website also answers any other questions you might have about this, including why they decided to push Tubman.

And it's not a silly waste of time. The bill was going to be redesigned ANYWAY, as part of an anti-piracy measure. That's the only reason why this is even happening. All of our bills go through redesigns to make them more difficult to pirate. That part of the process is far more time consuming than deciding whose portrait adorns it.