African-American Abolitionist Becomes First Woman On US Currency

Abolitionist Harriet Tubman will appear on front of the $20 bill, replacing former President Andrew Jackson and becoming the first woman featured on United States paper currency in modern times, a Treasury official said in deciding to leave Alexander Hamilton on the $10 note.

 The decision is the latest chapter in a 10-month-old controversy that erupted after Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew tried to address gender imbalance on US currency notes. He opened up the selection process to the public just as the current face on the $10 bill was enjoying a resurgence in popularity, and outrage ensued. 

The move Lew is announcing Wednesday is intended as a way to thread the needle between women’s groups who have been advocating for gender diversity on U.S. currency and fans of Hamilton, including Lin-Manuel Miranda, the playwright and star of the hit Broadway musical about the nation’s first Treasury secretary. Miranda lobbied Lew to keep Hamilton on the $10 when he visited Washington last month. 

Tubman (or “Moses”, as she was called) was an African-American abolitionist, humanitarian, and, during the American Civil War, a Union spy. Born into slavery, Tubman escaped and subsequently made some thirteen missions to rescue approximately seventy enslaved families and friends, using the network of antislavery activists and safe houses known as the Underground Railroad. 

She later helped abolitionist John Brown recruit men for his raid on Harpers 

Ferry, and in the post-war era was an active participant in the struggle for women’s suffrage. 

 Vanguard.