The Ten Dollar Bill Is Getting a Much-Needed Makeover

<a href="http://www.istockphoto.com/photo/close-up-on-a-ten-dollar-bill-10-us-3516704?st=d680b0d">chictype</a>/iStock

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Ladies—we have finally made it! On to money, that is. (I mean, sure, Sacagawea is on the dollar coin or whatever, but we’re talking real-deal-paper.) The Treasury Department announced Wednesday that a redesigned $10 bill will feature a woman alongside Alexander Hamilton, who has been on the note since 1929. 

Who will actually be featured on the bill remains to be seen, but Treasury Secretary Jack Lew will ultimately make the decision. The new $10 bill will debut in 2020, the 100-year anniversary of the 19th Amendment, which gave women the right to vote. 

The news comes just about a year after nine-year-old Sofia wrote to President Obama asking why there weren’t any women on money in the United States and included a list of potential contenders that included his wife, Michelle. He responded saying he thought it was “a pretty good idea.” The letter spawned a campaign called Women on 20, which launched petitions and created media to convince the president to put his money where his mouth is (literally).

It’s unclear if the decision was influenced by the campaign, but soon we will find out if any of their proposed female icons (the final-round votes on their website left Harriet Tubman, Eleanor Roosevelt, Rosa Parks, and Wilma Mankiller) made the cut.

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THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.

At least we hope they will, because that’s our approach to raising the $350,000 in online donations we need right now—during our high-stakes December fundraising push.

It’s the most important month of the year for our fundraising, with upward of 15 percent of our annual online total coming in during the final week—and there’s a lot to say about why Mother Jones’ journalism, and thus hitting that big number, matters tremendously right now.

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So we’re going to try making this as un-annoying as possible. In “Let the Facts Speak for Themselves” we give it our best shot, answering three questions that most any fundraising should try to speak to: Why us, why now, why does it matter?

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