The fool said, “Before he took office, New York was making plans to secede.” but in the real world it was just a crack-pot scheme by Mayor Wood and a few cronies. He thought he could create an island nation within a nation by expropriating the tariffs that the Port of New York collected.
No serious person took him or his scheme serious.
Let's examine the event before we dismiss it.
January 6, 1861, the Mayor of the city of New York, Fernando Wood made a formal demand in a speech to the Common Council that since disunion was a “fixed fact”, that New York should herself secede and become a free city with but a nominal duty upon imports. He said,
“Why should not New York City, instead of supporting by her contributions in revenue two- thirds of the expenses of the United States, become also equally independent? . . . If the confederacy is broken up . . . it behooves every distinct community, as well as every individual, to take care of themselves.
The Mayor proposed that New York secede and form a separate free city composed of the three islands, Long, Staten, and Manhattan. Wood envisioned New York City as a capitalist oasis, a free port trading with both Northern and Southern states. Other serious secession movements occurred in the Middle-Atlantic states, particularly in Maryland and New Jersey. The common element in these movements was to avoid Union with the New England states, and a strong central government.