Looks like Alexander Hamilton will keep his place on the $10 bill, with Andrew Jackson instead exiting the Twenty in favor of an iconic American woman.
As the paper Hamilton founded, we’d like to think the Obama administration’s finally taking our advice on something. But credit’s far more likely due to Lin-Manuel Miranda’s “Hamilton,” which on Monday won a Pulitzer.
Dropping broad hints on a decision he’ll announce this week, Treasury Secretary Jack Lew admitted on CNN this weekend, “Our economy, many of the institutions of our democracy, are really attributable to [Hamilton’s] contributions. He .?.?. will continue to be represented on the $10 bill.”
Rumor has it the only change will be to put a collage of history-making women on the back of the ten-spot — which wouldn’t bother ladies’ man Alex in the least. (As the show notes, “Martha Washington named her feral tomcat after him.”)
President Andrew Jackson was the founder of the Democratic Party, but also a proud slave-owner and Indian-slaughterer.
Hamilton is practically why we have money: As the nation’s first Treasury secretary, he designed the US financial system.
And that was after he wrote most of “The Federalist Papers” — essays that played a key role in getting the Constitution adopted.
And after he helped win the Revolution as Gen. George Washington’s right-hand man.
Yet now feminists are pushing hard to get a woman on the currency before the 2020 anniversary of full US women’s voting rights, and the bureaucrats insist only the Ten can be changed in time.
Hamilton looked doomed — then “Hamilton” opened. The show’s a marvel — something truly new on Broadway, historically accurate, dramatically and musically compelling, with joyful “cultural appropriation” running in all directions.
All combining to wow audiences with the tale of a “bastard, orphan” immigrant genius who hustled and wrote his way to the top — easily the most modern of the Founders, and a true New Yorker.
The fan base — and Lew’s own chance to see the show — came just in time.
Art has consequences.