Andrea L. Smith University of Arizona Citizenship in the Colony: Naturalization Law and Legal Assimilation in 19th Century Algeria Introduction You will find pell-mell in the streets of Algiers children of the Balearic Islands, especially Minorca (Mahonnais), Arabs from the desert, Moors, Koulouglis (born of Moorish women and Turkish men), Maltese, Spanish, Negres, Italians, Kabyles, Jews living in the same sun and the same air (Bard 1854:137). Next door to an elegant French milliner, an Arab barber was shaving the heads of his fellow-countrymen, and an Italian restauranteur, who extolled his macaroni to every passer-by, was the neighbor of a Moorish slipper- maker (Gordon 1845:15). Mid-nineteenth century Algeria was a colony of remarkable ethnic diversity, as the preceding descriptions by European visitors suggest. Subject to multiple invasions and colonizations over the past several millennia, Algeria by the time of the French conquest in 1830 was comprised of multiple language, religious, and ethnic groups, including several distinct Berber tribes, Arabs, indigenous Jews, "Andalous," or Muslims chased from Spain, 1 Turks, Kouloughlis, freed African slaves, and Mozabites, among others. There were also multiple active and relatively distinct legal systems. Added to this ethnic melange were European colonists, who began arriving immediately in the 1830s, particularly from areas bordering the Mediterranean. Settlers from Spain, Italy, and Malta outnumbered the French during the first several decades of French "rule," leading to much concern there and in France regarding demographic trends, foreigner assimilation, and the stability of French rule. How would the French colonial state cope with this ethnic diversity? The array of indigenous and European ethnicities presented a challenging continuum of identities that did not "sort" easily. Groups like the Arabic dialect-speaking Christian Maltese, 2 for example, posed problems; their very existence risked calling into question the "naturalness" of the categories "colonized" and "colonizer," and thus the legitimacy of the entire social order.