Here are the frontrunner women to be the face of the new $10 bill
Earlier this month, it was announced that our currency is making a major change for the much, much better. Starting in 2020, a woman will be featured on the $10 bill, the only criteria being that the woman chosen must be deceased. And according to a Marist poll released on Wednesday, former first lady and human rights advocate Eleanor Roosevelt is the front-runner among those surveyed at 27%. The second and third choices, respectively: abolitionist Harriet Tubman (17% of the vote) and Sacagawea, translator and guide for the Lewis and Clark expedition (13%).
A grassroots campaign entitled Women on 20s, which aimed to replace Andrew Jackson with a woman on the $20 bill, announced their personal poll-winning lady-of-choice to be Tubman back in May. Stars such as Ellen Degeneres and Susan Sarandon stood up for the organization’s cause. It seems as though the higher-ups in government listened to the wildly popular petition — though not in the exact way the organization had proposed.
“It’s been our goal from the beginning to see the face of a woman on our paper currency,” Susan Ades Stone, the executive director of Women on 20s, told The Washington Post in June. “So naturally I’m excited to hear that our mission will be accomplished. . . I can’t claim that we gave them the idea. I do believe that their decision to go to the public for input is the result of the public response to our campaign.”
However, there has been some controversy surrounding the decision to put a woman on the $10 bill instead of the $20. “Some people are saying it’s a lesser bill, and in fact it is a lesser bill both in value and in the fact that it is much less widely viewed and circulated,” Stone told the New York Times in June. “It’s not the face we see at the bank coming out of the ATM.”
It’s important to note that the poll does not mean that Roosevelt will be chosen as the new face of the $10 bill. The Treasury is keeping note of social media suggestions via the hashtag #TheNew10, and officials have been conducting round-table discussions and town-hall meetings. Ultimately, though, the decision is up to Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew. In the meantime, here are some suggestions for Lew via Twitter.
We sincerely hope that the American Treasury will listen to the voices of the American people as they make their decision, and we can’t wait to see who will be the face of our new $10 bill. If you’d like to make your voice heard, use the hashtag #TheNew10 to tell the Treasury who you think should be on the new bill.
(Image via Shutterstock)
