This proposed commonwealth, when once erected, and when it had
subjugated all Union men in the West who dared oppose it, would
eventually unite with the Confederacy; and in event of the latter's
success - which at the opening of the war to many seemed certain - the
territory of the Confederate States of America would embrace the entire
Southwest, and stretch from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Aside from its
general plans, the exact details of this plot are of course impossible
to secure. But that the conspiracy existed has never been disproved.

That the rebel sympathizers in California were plotting, as soon as the
War began, to take the Presidio at the entrance to the Golden Gate,
together with the forts on Alcatraz Island, the Custom House, the Mint,
the Post Office, and all United States property, and then having made
the formation of their Republic certain, invade the Mexican State of
Sonora and annex it to the new commonwealth, has never been gainsaid.
That these conspiracies existed and were held in grave seriousness is
revealed by the official correspondence of that time. That they had been
fomenting for many months is apparently revealed by this additional
fact: during Buchanan's administration, John B. Floyd, a southern man
who gave up his position to fight for the Confederacy, was Secretary of
War. When the Rebellion started, it was found[15] that Floyd, while in
office, had removed 135,430 firearms, together with much ammunition and
heavy ordnance, from the big Government arsenal at Springfield,
Massachusetts, and distributed them at various points in the South and
Southwest. Of this number, fifty thousand[16] were sent to California
where twenty-five thousand muskets had already been stored. And all this
was done underhandedly, without the knowledge of Congress.

California was unfortunate in having as a representative in the United
States Senate at this time, William Gwin, also a man of southern birth