Which woman should appear on new $10 bill?

WASHINGTON — Speculation is rising over which woman will be chosen to grace the $10 bill, which has featured Alexander Hamilton since 1929. The answer will come after summer, after Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew considers suggestions from anyone who wants to offer one through town hall meetings and online.

Whoever is chosen will be the first woman to appear on U.S. paper currency in more than a century. The bill’s design won’t be unveiled until 2020, the 100th anniversary of the passage of the 19th Amendment giving women the right to vote.

Treasury has created a website — www.thenew10.treasury.gov — for suggestions. In addition to proposing which woman should grace the bill, the public can suggest which symbols of democracy should be included. Comments can also be submitted on Twitter using #TheNew10.

The first information sessions will be Wednesday in Fort Worth, Texas, and July 15 in Washington at the two printing facilities that the Bureau of Engraving and Printing uses to produce the nation’s paper money.

The effort to put a woman on the currency began as a grassroots effort with a group known as Women on 20s, which launched a petition campaign to urge President Barack Obama to replace Andrew Jackson on the $20 bill with a woman.

Last summer, Obama expressed support for the effort. He said he had received a letter from a young girl suggesting such a change.

Lew offered no hints as to whom he might choose, saying he first wanted to hear the views of the public.

Women on 20s conducted an Internet poll in which more than 600,000 votes were cast. Harriet Tubman, the African-American abolitionist, emerged as the winner.

By law, only the portrait of a deceased person can appear on the nation’s banknotes.

The redesign of the $10 bill is the first since 2006, when new security features were added. A change in portraits on the bills is rare. The last such changes occurred between 1914 and 1928.