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June
20, 2002 9:20 a.m.
Off
the Dime
Let’s
end FDR’s reign.
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 esterday's
article on the nickel
got me thinking: What other changes to our currency might we contemplate?
There are plenty
of candidates. The new gold dollar coin has been a disaster. For the second
time in a quarter-century, the U.S. Mint has tried to replace the $1 bill
with a coin. Under pressure from feminists, both times it has chosen to
commemorate a woman, first the 19th-century suffragette Susan B. Anthony
and then the Indian girl Sacajawea.
It is doubtful whether
either of these figures deserves that honor before, say, a figure like
Teddy Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower, or Whittaker Chambers. But the real
problem seems to be that Americans prefer bills to coins for denominations
of $1 and higher.
Speaking of bills,
the redesigned versions with bigger portraits and different typefaces
have plenty of critics. I'm not one of them, but a number of my friends
can't stand the new look. Yet their complaint has more to do with appearance
than content. The bills do honor worthy people: Washington, Lincoln, Hamilton,
and Grant. (I think Franklin is on the $100 bill — again, a good
choice — but I'm not paid enough by NR to have seen very many.)
Lincoln, Jefferson,
and Washington on the penny, nickel, and quarter are an untouchable troika.
Each is a two-fer — on both paper and coin — and there's a good
case for keeping it that way. With the occasional talk about eliminating
the penny, it's a good thing Lincoln's image is also portrayed on the
$5 bill — a kind of insurance policy. Jefferson is technically featured
on the $2 bill, but you'd forgotten that, hadn't you? The truth is, nobody
uses the $2 bill, so it doesn't count. Finally, Washington is, in the
words of Light Horse Harry Lee, "first in war, first in peace, and
first in the hearts of his countrymen." He can be on the $1 bill
(the most powerful symbol of American capitalism in the world) and the
quarter. Thinking otherwise is un-American.
That leaves the dime,
which honors Franklin Delano Roosevelt. There's plenty to be said about
FDR, but for now just read Mark Levin's recent NRO
column. The dime could use a new guy on it.
How about Ronald
Reagan? There's already a Reagan
Legacy Project devoted to putting the 40th president's name on public
landmarks around the country. The renaming of the Ronald Reagan Washington
National Airport in 1998 is its most noteworthy achievement.
It could use another
big project, and putting a low-tax man on American currency is a proper
thing to do.
Treasury secretary
Paul O'Neill has the power simply to order the change — he can alter
coins once every 25 years without congressional approval. So please, Paul,
make our day: Put Reagan on the dime.
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