Suquamish Indian Tribe Adopts Same Sex Marriage
A touching story of one woman’s successful request for equality.
The tribe has about 1,000 members and these meetings are one of their biggest gatherings.
PURSER: And then everyone voted and everyone said, aye. And I just…
(SOUNDBITE OF LAUGHTER)
PURSER: I could have fallen down, I was so shocked. It was one of the best moments of my entire life.
LEONARD FORSMAN: It really was no huge obstacle for the tribe in a political or cultural sense.
JONES: Leonard Forsman is the chairman of the tribe’s governing council. The tribe’s attorney revised its marriage ordinance to include same-sex marriage. And this month, the seven-member council unanimously approved it.
Forsman sconcedes some tribal members may disagree with gay marriage, but he says they disagree more with discrimination.
FORSMAN: We don’t go out and try to brand people if we can help it, because we were branded as being lazy or being uneducated. We don’t want to have those same things applied by our tribal government onto others.