Even uniformed black veterans were barred from homestead claims

Evidence

“Ironically, black men who served on the Union side during the war and even remained enlisted as Buffalo Soldiers to help protect settlers on the frontier from outlaws and Indian attacks,” Dr. Trina Shanks explains, “were denied the opportunity to make land claims in some of the very communities they fought to defend.” Once the 1866 Civil Rights Act was passed, black Americans became citizens and so were now eligible to participate in the Homestead Act, but they were often unable to overcome the barriers of racial discrimination. — Dorothy A. Brown, Getting to Reparations, 331