It's a nice hairdo. However, the US coin has some serious flaws that are a result of the design-by-committee attitude of the US mint under President Obama. Let me preface this by saying it has nothing to do with Liberty being black. I could care less what race she is, and US coinage has already depicted multi-racial Lady Liberties before. The problem is that since 2010 the US mint has had no Chief Engraver, and this reflects badly on the coinage since then. I hope that is remedied shortly after next Friday. For starters, the stars on Lady Liberty are way too big. This design is based on Lady Liberty in the US Capitol, however, that statue has a smaller and more proportional, clean looking, and stylish star crown. Rather than copy that, they went with oversized clownish looking stars that look like they were designed by the same guy who designed the Mickey Mouse ears. Second, they are now designing these things via computer instead of having a master sculptor create a bust and then scaling the design down, which means the facial features don't look quite right (too flat). Computers have their limitations when it comes to this stuff. Third, the eagle on the reverse is OK, but the difference in font types between the obverse and reverse look atrocious. I feel like I'm looking at the obverse and reverse of two different coins. All these things could have been fixed rather easily if there has been a Chief Engraver to oversee this stuff, and this coin would have looked a thousand times better. This is what happens when you get a committee looking to fullfil a political agenda doing the work, rather than a professional mint looking to do a proper classic and well executed rendition of an African American Lady Liberty. This coin's theme had a lot of potential, but the mint workers botched it up. We need a Chief Engraver badly. Believe me when I say this coin (despite those flaws) is actually decent compared to some of the atrocious commemorative coins the mint has been producing since 2010.
If they had the exact same bust with a diadem that said "LIBERTY"--like on the obverse of the V nickel--it would be an absolutely marvelous coin.
I just went to the US Mint website and checked out the current commemorative coin they have on sale. I would not pay $46 for a coin with this obverse. That face, LOL. In ancient Rome that would have probably seen the celator thrown off the Tarpeian Rock by the Emperor himself.
