Former Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke is right, placing the image of an influential woman from the annals of history on a U.S. bill is a great idea, but removing Alexander Hamilton from the $10 note is a terrible choice. Dump President Andrew Jackson from the $20 bill.

It is arguably more fitting to memorialize Mr. Hamilton on currency than it is anyone else. He was the first treasury secretary and, as such, the architect of America’s emerging national economy, including establishing the country’s first national bank. It was Mr. Hamilton who pushed for a national currency, rather than relying on the hodge-podge of different currencies minted by states and local governments.

Before that, he was a Revolutionary War aide to Gen. George Washington and among the authors of the Federalist Papers, a true founding father.

Let Hamilton be on the 1 percent G.

In contrast, President Andrew Jackson’s terms (1829-1837) were lowlighted with some bizarre economic policy. He dismantled the Bank of the United States, which had provided a stable and legitimate currency acceptable as payment to the federal government. A populist, he contended the bank only favored the rich.

Later in his presidency, he would reject the use of paper currency as unreliable, insisting on the use of “hard currency” — coins. Banks were tossed into disarray and investment dropped. Just after his successor, President Martin van Buren,  took office the economy crashed in the Panic of 1837.

Yet President Jackson’s economic policies were stellar compared to his human rights record. He ignored the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Worcester v. Georgia, when it declared the Cherokee Nation to be a sovereign, “distinct community, occupying its own territory” with “the preexisting power of the Nation to govern itself.”

Instead, he pursued the mass relocation of Native Americans, including moving the Cherokee from Georgia to Oklahoma, a death march in which more than 4,000 died. Other tribes were moved out of the Southeast by the Jackson administration without any attempt at the negotiations called for by the Indian Removal Act of 1830. History recalls these forced migrations as the “Trail of Tears.”

Women such as Rosa Parks, Harriet Tubman or Eleanor Roosevelt deserve the proposed distinction, but by replacing President Jackson.