This is Jim Webb's bizarre defense of Andrew Jackson's place on the $20 bill


Former Democratic presidential candidate Jim Webb is just a tad disgruntled by the most recent wave of criticism leveled at former President Andrew Jackson, in light of the news that Harriet Tubman will be sharing in his $20 bill spotlight. He tackled the ongoing debate in a Washington Post op-ed published Sunday:
This dismissive characterization of one of our great presidents is not occurring in a vacuum. Any white person whose ancestral relations trace to the American South now risks being characterized as having roots based on bigotry and undeserved privilege. Meanwhile, race relations are at their worst point in decades. [The Washington Post]
Webb acknowledged that Jackson owned slaves and also infamously ordered Native American tribes to head east of the Mississippi River, but questioned whether the Trail of Tears was really intended to be "genocidal."
He ultimately asserted that both Jackson and Tubman deserve respect for their contributions to the nation. Read the rest of his stance, including a gratuitous Mark Twain quotation, here.
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Julie Kliegman is a freelance writer based in New York. Her work has appeared in BuzzFeed, Vox, Mental Floss, Paste, the Tampa Bay Times and PolitiFact. Her cats can do somersaults.
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