Arequipa sent deputies to the Sicuani Assembly of March 1836,[1] where the Constitution of the Southern Peruvian State was drafted under the guidance of the then rebel politician Nicolás Fernández de Piérola y Flores [es] in the midst of the Peruvian civil war since 1835.

[1] The constitution proclaimed the state of South Peru and the alliance with the Bolivian occupation forces for the creation of the Peru-Bolivian Confederation.

[2] With Piérola's victory, the Fundamental Law of 1837 in Tacna, with approval of the self-proclaimed supreme protector Andrés de Santa Cruz, recognized Arequipa as a founding department of the Confederation.

[2] The governor was obliged to elect representatives of his department to participate in the assemblies of Sicuani, which were ordered by the president of the South Peruvian State.

[4][3] After Blanco Encalada's troops arrived in Valparaíso, he was met with hostile demonstrations and the Chilean government repudiated the treaty.