House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Thursday said Frances Perkins, the first woman appointed to a presidential Cabinet, should be one of the women considered for a new $10 bill design.
Pelosi was asked about a list of women who have been mentioned for the currency.
{mosads}“I would add Frances Perkins, who is the first woman Cabinet officer and the author of Social Security,” she said during the news conference in Washington, D.C. “She certainly has affected many lives.”
Perkins served as former President Franklin Roosevelt’s secretary of Labor, from 1933 to 1945.
She is notable for having helped implement the first minimum wage, overtime laws and the 40-hour workweek.
Treasury Secretary Jack Lew revealed on Thursday that his agency would select a woman to appear on the $10 currency by the end of the year.
Pelosi praised American history’s wide range of influential women during her remarks later that afternoon.
“I’m a big fan of so many of the women who are being suggested, and any one of them, it would – it would be absolutely great,” she said.
She cited civil rights activist Rosa Parks, abolitionist Sojourner Truth and disabled rights activist Helen Keller as options for the paper money on Thursday.
The California lawmaker additionally said that Treasury officials should not stop with the $10 bill.
“So I’m pretty excited about it all — all of the names that have been suggested,” Pelosi said.
“You might want to look at some other denominations as well,” she added. “Why should we be confined to one?”
A woman has not appeared on U.S currency in more than a century. Martha Washington and Pocahontas each appeared on paper tender more than 100 years ago, Treasury officials said.