 When the black–red–gold tricolour was adopted by the Weimar Republic as its flag, it was attacked by conservatives, monarchists, and the far right, who referred to the colours with spiteful nicknames such as (black–red–yellow) or even (black–red–mustard).When the Nazis came to power in 1933, the black–white–red colours of pre-1918 Imperial Germany were swiftly reintroduced, and their propaganda machine continued to discredit the , using the same derogatory terms as previously used by the monarchists.On 16 November 1959, the Federal Court of Justice () stated that the usage of "black–red–yellow" and the like had "through years of Nazi agitation, attained the significance of a malicious slander against the democratic symbols of the state" and was now an offence.