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The article focuses on changes in practice between 1999 and 2004 on the part of prefectoral officials in charge of the preparation of dossiers of applicants for “territorial” asylum, mainly Algerians. At the time, French legislation on the right of asylum was undergoing reform. The study, based on interviews with officials, reports contained in dossiers and observation of hearings, shows how prefectoral employees set about actively reinterpreting legal rules in their ways of classifying asylum seekers. The civil servants concerned were note trained in law and had no power of decision but did none the less work out a set of regulations with a view to submitting argmented opinions to the ministry. The exceptional, sensitive and discretionary nature of the legal provisions concerned made for extension rather than restriction of official’s latitude for action. Analysis further reveals two contrasting modes of this action in the context of imminent change in the law on the right of asylum : one based on selection and the other on elimination, survival of earlier practice and anticipation of a change in the law. “Territorial” right of asylum was repealed by the act of December 10,2003. At a time of redefinition of European identity it was a last phase in the history of “paradoxical citizenship” of Algerians in France.