A WaPo opinion piece compares the modern “Dreamers” to the Civil War Colored Troops. The premise is shoehorned but the history is interesting. I’d done a fair amount of reading on the USCT, but hadn’t realised their already-reduced pay was docked even further by a clothing fee. Those soldiers earned their belated monument!

As evidence of the regard in which they were held, LaBarre quoted Massachusetts Gov. John Albion Andrew’s commendation of the 5th Massachusetts Cavalry when it was launched: “In this hour of hope for our common country and for themselves; at a time when they hold the destiny of their race in their own grasp; and when its certain emancipation from prejudice, as well as slavery, is in the hands of those now invited to unite in the final blow which will annihilate the rebel power, let no brave and strong man hesitate. One cannot exaggerate the call sounding in the ears of all men, in whose veins flows the blood of Africa, and whose color has been the badge of slavery. It offers the opportunity of years, crowded into an hour.”

Source: The black men of the Civil War were America’s original ‘dreamers’ – The Washington Post