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Looks as if Harriet Tubman may finally make the $20 FRN

President Joe Biden’s press secretary, Jen Psaki, announced on Monday that the Treasury Department is taking steps to resume efforts to put the likeness of Harriet Tubman on the face of the $20 Federal Reserve note. This effort was started under President Obama, but killed by President Trump. For those who never heard of her, Tubman was a Bible-toting, gun-packing, hard-core Republican, female former slave, abolitionist and Union spy (during the War Between the States).

Comments

  • Steve_in_TampaSteve_in_Tampa Posts: 1,959 ✭✭✭✭✭

    This is being discussed on forums virtually everywhere with mixed opinions. Hopefully the opinions here will remain civil.

  • OnastoneOnastone Posts: 3,954 ✭✭✭✭✭

    I'm glad this wasn't completely destroyed and glad it's back on the table. I think there was talk about changing other currency too...(it's certainly time for a "large head" Washington).

  • sellitstoresellitstore Posts: 2,870 ✭✭✭✭✭

    I was just reading in a recent "Paper Money" (Journal of the Society of Paper Money Collectors) about the standardization of U.S. paper money designs just over 100 years ago. Back then, the reason was to avoid confusion between the several different types of notes in circulation, each with different designs (Silver Certificates, Legal Tender Notes, Nationals, Federal Reserve Notes and Federal Reserve Bank Notes. In recent years, the standardized portraits (and general stability) over the decades has been an asset in the circulation of our currency overseas.

    New designs would be nice for the collector but security and other considerations have been the driving factors in currency redesign in recent decades. We'll see what happens. This could open the door to other new designs, even currency without portraits but illustrating other things, material and/or conceptual.

    Collector and dealer in obsolete currency. Always buying all obsolete bank notes and scrip.
  • silverpopsilverpop Posts: 6,679 ✭✭✭✭✭

    let's hope this new $20 looks better then what we have now

  • ernie11ernie11 Posts: 1,945 ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited February 5, 2021 7:17AM

    I always wondered whether the people responsible for Jackson being on paper money realized the irony of putting him on a Federal Reserve note, when Jackson fought so hard (and successfully) to dismantle the Second Bank of the United States. Also I have read, though I can't confirm this, that he was a gold / silver advocate, so putting him on any type of paper currency could've been ironic, too. It's probably a good thing that Andy wasn't alive any more when all of this happened!

  • johnny9434johnny9434 Posts: 28,334 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Will see how far it goes

  • Steve_in_TampaSteve_in_Tampa Posts: 1,959 ✭✭✭✭✭

    @BadWithMoney said:
    Yes, after trump is back in office next week he will probably stop this from happening!

    Wait, What ?! I almost spit out my coffee laughing at this comment.

  • Serial_no_8Serial_no_8 Posts: 455 ✭✭✭

    It already happened in Canada (with the Viola Desmond note replacing J A MacDonald on our $10).

  • sellitstoresellitstore Posts: 2,870 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Yes, but Canada stopped putting political leaders on notes decades ago. The U.S. dead presidents only tradition goes back for over a century.

    Collector and dealer in obsolete currency. Always buying all obsolete bank notes and scrip.
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  • sellitstoresellitstore Posts: 2,870 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Yes, you are correct.

    I should have said dead presidents and other prominent politicians.

    "Dead presidents" is how we refer to current US cash, although not technically accurate.

    Collector and dealer in obsolete currency. Always buying all obsolete bank notes and scrip.
  • CrustyCrusty Posts: 1,108 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Jackson is one of my favorite presidents and did so much for this country… Definitely disappointed to hear this.

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  • CrustyCrusty Posts: 1,108 ✭✭✭✭✭

    @BadWithMoney said:
    The things he did is why he is being removed.

    I can’t respond to you the way I’d like to without breaking the forum rules. So I’m out….

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  • cashhoundcashhound Posts: 58 ✭✭✭
    edited August 27, 2021 3:28AM

    IMHO, I feel that the removal of Jackson's face on the twenty dollar note would be the same as tearing down a historic statue.

  • Steve_in_TampaSteve_in_Tampa Posts: 1,959 ✭✭✭✭✭

    If President Jackson had a say in all of this, I’d bet he would want his portrait removed. Jackson was not a big fan of paper money. His opinion was that paper currency wasn’t real.

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  • dcarrdcarr Posts: 8,470 ✭✭✭✭✭

    @ernie11 said:
    I always wondered whether the people responsible for Jackson being on paper money realized the irony of putting him on a Federal Reserve note, when Jackson fought so hard (and successfully) to dismantle the Second Bank of the United States. Also I have read, though I can't confirm this, that he was a gold / silver advocate, so putting him on any type of paper currency could've been ironic, too. It's probably a good thing that Andy wasn't alive any more when all of this happened!

    And Washington specifically requested that he NOT be depicted on the nation's money.

    Anyway, I'm not a huge fan of Hamilton (due to his efforts regarding the First Bank of the United States). So I would have preferred that Tubman replace Hamilton rather than Jackson.

  • tcollectstcollects Posts: 1,057 ✭✭✭✭✭

    I'd love to see Harriet Tubman on the $20, Lin-Manuel Miranda on the $10, and Joe Exotic or that badass girl who got her arm bitten off on the $1

    Move GW to a $1000 bill

    we can do better

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  • kiyotekiyote Posts: 5,573 ✭✭✭✭✭

    At this point I’d like to just see pastoral scenes like old farm houses or fields or cattle grazing or something like that. Much less political

    "I'll split the atom! I am the fifth dimension! I am the eighth wonder of the world!" -Gef the talking mongoose.
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  • Serial_no_8Serial_no_8 Posts: 455 ✭✭✭

    That's a "beauty" as we're apt to say up here "in the great white north."

  • sellitstoresellitstore Posts: 2,870 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Always loved that design as well as a few others that depict Canadian scenes, like some of the wonderful maritime scenes from the Atlantic time zone.

    Tubman is worthy of honor and respect but there are plenty of others that I would choose above Tubman, if we are expanding the criteria for the high bar of depiction on Federal Reserve Notes. So far, it's been a very elite club. We can admit a few more members or swing the doors open wide and include a wide range of subjects, or keep the club very exclusive.

    How about the Wright Brothers first flight at Kitty Hawk, N.C., Dec 1903 as a central vignette, a rendering of the classic image with one brother lying flat in the aircraft and the other running alongside? I like the inventor theme for a regular or commemorative issue.

    Collector and dealer in obsolete currency. Always buying all obsolete bank notes and scrip.
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  • Why not create a note commemorating the foundation of the Fed?

  • Namvet69Namvet69 Posts: 8,975 ✭✭✭✭✭

    The educational series banknotes were beautiful. IMO. Peace Roy

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