Homestead Act: Questions

If in 1862, the U.S. government carefully drafted a law allowing women, immigrants, and Blacks to own property, why did it take so much longer (1865 for abolition of slavery, 1868 for Black and immigrant citizenship, 1870 for Black suffrage, 1920 for women’s right to vote) for them to actually be awarded the full rights of citizenship?
How would you go about prepping for a five-year (at least) excursion to the wilds of the Western Territories if you’d lived all your life in a city?
How about the Native Americans? What did the Homestead Act mean for the land that was already occupied?
What do you think happened after the Civil War if all those Southerners were excluded from the Homestead Act?
With no smart phones and no internet, not to mention no reliable communication with civilization, just how did homesteaders learn how to survive off the land?