The Crémieux Decree (; pronounced as /fr/) was a law that granted French citizenship to the majority of the Jewish population in French Algeria (around 35,000), signed by the Government of National Defense on 24 October 1870 during the Franco-Prussian War. It was named after French-Jewish lawyer and Minister of Justice Adolphe Crémieux.[1]
The decree automatically made the native Algerian Jews French citizens, while their Muslim Arab and Berber neighbors were excluded and remained under the second-class indigenous status outlined in the code de l'Indigénat. As a result, the decree did not grant citizenship to Mozabite Jews. Mozabite Jews were granted “common law civil status” and French citizenship in 1961, over 90 years later.[2]
Muslim Algerians could, on paper, apply individually for French citizenship, but this required that they formally renounce Islam and its laws,[3] and their requests were additionally very seldom accepted. That set the scene for deteriorating relations between the Muslim and Jewish communities, with tensions increased by the colonial administration discrimination between natives and citizens. Seeing one's indigenous brother become a first class citizen while being left as a second class citizen divided locals with animosity.
This eventually proved fateful in the 1954–1962 Algerian War, after which the vast majority of the Jews of Algeria emigrated to France.
See main article: History of the Jews in Algeria. Jews first migrated to Algeria during the Roman period.[4] The Spanish inquisition also led to an influx of Jewish migration.[5] France conquered Algeria in 1830-1834. France became focused on assimilating colonized people into French citizens, and a Sénatus-consulte in 1865 revised citizenship laws to allow indigenous Algerians to apply for French citizenship.[6] But Algerian culture prided itself on its customary practices, and as a result application rates were low.[7] Many European Jews lived in France, and so the French believed that Algerian Jews would be more likely to assimilate due to having Sephardic (Portuguese Jews, like Crémieux's mother) and also Ashkenazi relatives in France. Thus, Jews gained recognition in France as a means of control: the French government having realized that, by enabling Ashkenazi practices, they could appoint chief Rabbis with a duty to "inculcate unconditional obedience to the laws, loyalty to France, and the obligation to defend it". France had already given the Sephardic Jews of France citizenship in 1790, and almost two years after, in September 1791, granted citizenship to their Ashkenazi co-religionists who were seen as less French at the time.[8] By granting citizenship to Algerian Jews, the French believed the local Jews would forgo their traditions, and become loyal to France.[9] The intent was rapid acculturation of Algerian Jews into French Jews.
It was signed as Decree 136 of 1870[10] by Adolphe Crémieux as Minister of Justice, Léon Gambetta as Minister of the Interior, and Léon Martin Fourichon as Minister of the Navy and the Colonies. These ministers were members of the provisional Government of National Defense (based in Tours, since France was at war and Paris was besieged. The Muslim revolt of 1871 created distrust of the indigenous non-Jews, as it established that they would not respect French authority. This amplified French desire to attempt the assimilation of Algerian Jews over other indigenous communities who, it was felt, would be more resistant.
At the same time, the naturalization regime in French Algeria was confirmed by Decree 137, which stated that Algerian Muslims were not French citizens. The aim was to maintain the status quo, the sovereignty of France over its North African colonies. Five years later, in 1875, this was confirmed in the framework of the code de l'indigénat.
Decrees 136 and 137 were published in Official Gazette of the City of Tours (Bulletin officielle de la ville de Tours) on 7 November 1870.
Within a generation, most Algerian Jews came to speak French and embrace French culture in its entirety. Conflicts between Sephardic Jewish religious law and French law troubled community members as they attempted to navigate a legal system at odds with their established practice. The French army's control over civilian life in Algeria was limited, as Algerian Jews were legally viewed as equal to other French citizens. The Crémieux Decree also heightened French feelings of racial superiority in Algeria. Many French colonists refused to accept Jews as citizens, leading to a wave of antisemitism that continued to worsen well into the mid-1900s.[11] This led to a divide after the 1882 conquest of M'zab when the French government categorized Southern Algerian Jews and Northern Algerian Jews as distinct groups, recognizing only the rights of the latter, while treating the former as indigenous Algerians.[12]
Following the fall of France and the formation of the Vichy government, Interior Minister Marcel Peyrouton abolished the decree on 7 October 1940, at the same time as the new government promoted antisemitic laws in metropolitan France.[13]
After the Anglo-American landings in Algeria and Morocco in November 1942, Vichyist Admiral François Darlan was initially kept in power by the Allies and did not abrogate the laws of Vichy. After Darlan's assassination on December 24, 1942, General Henri Giraud was appointed French Civil and Military Commander-in-Chief and, on March 14, 1943, he revoked the antisemitic laws of Vichy and reinstated the Crémieux decree. The Decree remained in effect until Algeria won its independence in 1962 and most of the Algerian Jewish population relocated to France.