<P> By 1848 nearly all of northern Algeria was under French control . Important tools of the colonial administration, from this time until their elimination in the 1870s, were the bureaux arabes (Arab offices), staffed by Arabists whose function was to collect information on the indigenous people and to carry out administrative functions, nominally in cooperation with the army . The bureaux arabes on occasion acted with sympathy to the local population and formed a buffer between Muslims and colons . </P> <P> Under the régime du sabre, the colons had been permitted limited self - government in areas where European settlement was most intense, but there was constant friction between them and the army . The colons charged that the bureaux arabes hindered the progress of colonization . They agitated against military rule, complaining that their legal rights were denied under the arbitrary controls imposed on the colony and insisting on a civil administration for Algeria fully integrated with metropolitan France . The army warned that the introduction of civilian government would invite Muslim retaliation and threaten the security of Algeria . The French government vacillated in its policy, yielding small concessions to the colon demands on the one hand while maintaining the régime du sabre to control the Muslim majority on the other . </P> <P> Shortly after Louis Philippe's constitutional monarchy was overthrown in the revolution of 1848, the new government of the Second Republic ended Algeria's status as a colony and declared in the 1848 Constitution the occupied lands an integral part of France . Three civil territories--Alger, Oran, and Constantine--were organized as Departments of France (local administrative units) under a civilian government . This made them a part of France proper as opposed to a colony . For the first time, French citizens in the civil territories elected their own councils and mayors; Muslims had to be appointed, could not hold more than one - third of council seats, and could not serve as mayors or assistant mayors . The administration of territories outside the zones settled by colons remained under the French Army . Local Muslim administration was allowed to continue under the supervision of French Army commanders, charged with maintaining order in newly pacified regions, and the bureaux arabes . Theoretically, these areas were closed to European colonization . </P> <P> Even before the decision was made to annex Algeria, major changes had taken place . In a bargain - hunting frenzy to take over or buy at low prices all manner of property--homes, shops, farms and factories--Europeans poured into Algiers after it fell . French authorities took possession of the beylik lands, from which Ottoman officials had derived income . Over time, as pressures increased to obtain more land for settlement by Europeans, the state seized more categories of land, particularly that used by tribes, religious foundations, and villages . </P>

When did algeria became a department of france