As the period of Cæsar’s command would expire in the year 49 B. C., he
had determined to obtain the consulship for the year 48 B. C., since
otherwise he would become a private citizen. Accordingly he demanded,
though absent, to be permitted to put himself in the lists for the
consulate. But it was proposed, through the influence of Pompey, that
Cæsar should lay down his command by the thirteenth of November, 50 B.
C. This was an unreasonable demand; for his term of government over Gaul
had another year to run, and if he had gone to Rome as a private citizen
to sue for the consulship, there can be no doubt that his life would
have been sacrificed. Cæsar, still anxious to keep the peace, offered,
at the beginning of the year 49 B. C., to lay down his command if Pompey
would do the same; but this the senate refused to accede to, and a
motion was passed that Cæsar should disband his army by a certain day,
and that if he did not do so, he should be regarded as an enemy of the
state.