 In the Nazi era (1938–45) the Croatian language was officially prohibited, and the state pursued an aggressive policy of Germanization.The Austrian State Treaty of 1955 guaranteed minority rights for every native ethnic minority in Austria but Croats had to fight for the use of their language in schools and offices even in the 1960s and 1970s.In 2000 51 new bilingual village name signs were erected in Burgenland (47 Croatian and 4 Hungarian).