By Lauren Wanko
Correspondent
They’re faces just about everyone’s familiar with — George Washington, Andrew Jackson. As presidents they’ve cemented their place not only in history, but in our wallets. Wallets full of famous male Americans.
“A couple of years ago it occurred to me that we had no women on our paper currency and I was startled about this omission,” said Barbara Ortiz Howard.
Which is why Howard founded the non-profit Women On 20s. Its mission? To replace Andrew Jackson on the $20 dollar with a credible female who’s positively impacted our country.
“We were looking at 10s and 20s. The $20 bill as we looked at it a little more we realized Andrew Jackson on it had a mixed legacy and a controversial one,” Howard said.
Coupled with the fact he didn’t even like paper currency says Howard.
Women On 20s started with 100 potential female candidates. That process started two years ago. A team of historians and those involved in women studies developed a system to narrow down the list. They evaluated the women’s impact on society and how many obstacles they had to overcome to achieve their goals. That led to the 15 candidates on the list.
The non-profit’s asking voters to cast their ballot on their website in conjunction with Women’s History Month. So far they’ve gotten more 60,000 votes in just 13 days. Their goal — to have the new woman’s bill issued by 2020 for the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment, which gave women the right to vote.
“What better way to celebrate women and their contributions to our society then to have them integrated in our everyday lives on money?” asked Howard.
“To be honest I don’t really think about it. I know other countries have prominent women on their money. Like England has, Canada does too I think,” said Sam Hartung.
The portraits on our paper currency were adopted in 1929.
President Obama spoke about the topic this past summer. “Last week a young girl wrote to ask me whey aren’t there any women on our currency and then she gave me a long list, which I though was a pretty good idea,” he said.
“He would have to ask the secretary of Treasury to go ahead with it. The secretary of Treasury has the authority to say what our money is gonna look like,” Howard said.
Howard thinks a woman’s bill will empower not only young girls, but all Americans fighting for gender equality.
Women On 20s hopes to get 100,000 votes or more be the end of the month.