General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsIs the time right to dock Old Hickory?
Steelhammer: Is the time right to dock Old Hickory?
by Rick Steelhammer, Staff writer
As much as I can get attached to the look and feel of one or more $20 bills taking up space in my pocket, Im not sentimental about the guy whose image appears on the face of the folding money.
In fact, Ive often wondered what it was that former President Andrew Jackson did to elevate him from relative obscurity to the ranks of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln and Benjamin Franklin as the subject of a cover portrait used to decorate American paper currency.
Jackson, who in his double sawbuck portrait looks a little startled himself to be fronting the bill, was, after a long hiatus, in the news again last week. A group called Women on $20s is calling for Jacksons image to be replaced by that of a more deserving female figure from American history. The organization is calling for an unofficial popular vote to from a list of 15 candidates, ranging from Sojourner Truth and Clara Barton to Harriet Tubman and Eleanor Roosevelt, to select Jacksons replacement.
In my view, Jackson is overdue for replacement. It was under his watch as president, and with his blessing, that the Indian Removal Act of 1830 was passed, clearing the way for the Trail of Tears -- the forced relocation of Cherokee, Choctaw, Seminole and other American Indians from their homelands in the U.S. South to relatively barren and totally unfamiliar points west of the Mississippi. Once that mission was accomplished, more southern land was available for development by plantation owners like Jackson, who owned 150 slaves at the time of his death.
Putting those reasons aside, Jackson was an outspoken critic of paper money...
More
http://www.wvgazette.com/article/20150308/GZ01/150309293
International Women's Day - March 8
virgogal
(10,178 posts)msongs
(67,413 posts)TexasProgresive
(12,157 posts)John Poet
(2,510 posts)that I can recall...
Of course, turning back the British at the Battle of New Orleans in Jan. 1815,
and
when he threatened to hang the "nullifiers" in South Carolina, who were making some of their first noises about secession.. and they were forced to back down.
Nothing else in particular comes to mind.
UTUSN
(70,700 posts)Cooley Hurd
(26,877 posts)Welcome to DU! </newyawker99>
I'm not a huge Jackson fan (although "5" rocked ), and would like to see Eleanor Roosevelt on the 20 spot!
NYC_SKP
(68,644 posts)Just for the nostalgia of the thing.
And we can change the $50 to include a great female historic figure, like Rosa Parks.
Warpy
(111,267 posts)because I knew descendents of Cherokees who refused to go in NC and descendents of Cherokees who did and barely survived out here in NM. He's there mostly because of the Battle of New Orleans. That shouldn't be enough to get a spot on the money.
Margaret Sanger was a complex and deeply flawed woman, but her tireless work of allowing women to control the number of children they had should earn her the spot. It liberated half the people in the country from having children they didn't want and couldn't care for and being old by the age of thirty.
Besides, it would be fun to see all the televangelists and bishops shitting bricks.
YarnAddict
(1,850 posts)was a racist and a eugenicist.
So--really?
Warpy
(111,267 posts)She was deeply flawed, as I said, but the freedom she offered to half the human race can't be underestimated. Of all feminist icons, we owe the most to her. So do all the people who grew up wanted, not accidental and catastrophic.
raccoon
(31,111 posts)would prefer any of the women mentioned to Jackson.
Tierra_y_Libertad
(50,414 posts)You know, people who actually do something for humanity.
monmouth4
(9,708 posts)have contributed immensely to the human race...Yep, I definitely like this idea...