Hoyer: No One More Suited Than Tubman to Be Honored

Congressman Steny H. Hoyer (D-MD) spoke on the floor of the US House of Representatives recently in support of the announcement by Treasury Secretary Jack Lew that Harriet Tubman and other American women will be added to U.S. currency.

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The congressman’s statement appears below:

“Mr. Speaker, [April 20] the Secretary of the Treasury [Jack] Lew announced that for the first time U.S. paper currency will feature portraits of great American women.

“I am very proud that a Maryland native, an abolition hero, Harriet Tubman, was selected to be the new face on the $20 bill. Born into slavery on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, she escaped to freedom, but returned to rescue her family members. It was dangerous and could easily have cost Tubman her life or her freedom. But after rescuing her family, she kept coming back for others who sought freedom. Using the alias ‘Moses’ – how appropriate – she brought dozens of people out of slavery, never once losing a passenger on her Underground Railroad route.

“During the Civil War, she was an agent for the Union. In the decades following the war, she was active in the movement for women’s suffrage.

“I can think of no one more suited to be honored with the portrait on the $20 bill. I’m also pleased that other women will be featured on our currency and I yield back the balance of my time.”

Following the announcement of Tubman’s selection, Congressman Hoyer had said that for too long, women have been absent from the country’s paper currency, in spite of incalculable contributions by women to our country.

He also said it was fitting fitting that the leaders of the women’s suffrage movement will join Alexander Hamilton on the $10 bill and that women who were instrumental in standing up for civil rights will join Abraham Lincoln on the $5 bill.