The President is elected by the Federal Convention, a body established solely for that purpose. Christian Wulff was elected Federal President in the 2010 presidential election. The first official residence of the President is the Bellevue Palace in Berlin. The President's second official residence is the Hammerschmidt Villa in Bonn.
Federal President is elected by secret ballot, without debate, by the Federal Convention, a body established solely for that purpose. The convention consists of all Bundestag members as well as an equal number of delegates chosen by the legislatures of the Länder (states). The delegates of each Land to the Federal Convention are elected by the members of the state legislature under a form of proportional representation. However it is not required that Land delegates themselves be members of a legislature; often prominent citizens are chosen.
In total, the Federal Convention numbers more than one thousand members. The German constitution, the Basic Law, requires that it be convened no later than thirty days before the expiration of the term of office of the President (which is five years). The body is convened and chaired by the President of the Bundestag. Since 1979, all these conventions have been held on 23 May, the date of the foundation of the Federal Republic in 1949. An exception to this was the 2010 election, since Horst Köhler stepped down from his office before his term was over.
In the event of a national crisis, the emergency law reforms of 1968 designate the President as a mediator. If the Bundestag rejects a motion of confidence, but neither a new chancellor is elected nor the Bundestag is dissolved, the President may, by request of the cabinet, declare a "legislative state of emergency", which is quite different from a conventional state of emergency: If it is declared, during a limited period of time, bills proposed by the cabinet and designated as "urgent", but rejected by the Bundestag, become law nonetheless, if the Bundesrat does pass them. But the legislative state of emergency does not suspend basic human rights nor does it grant the executive branch any exceptional power. Such an emergency has never been declared.
Though usually chosen as the candidate of a political party or parties, the president nonetheless is expected to be non-partisan after assuming office. Every President to date has let his or her party membership rest dormant during his term of office. Although the formal powers of the President are limited, the President's role can be quite significant depending on his or her own activities. The very fact that the President usually doesn't interfere with day-to-day politics means that if he or she does choose to speak out on an issue, the event is perceived as one to take note of. There have been a number of occasions when certain presidential speeches have dominated German political debate for a year or more.
The role of President is partly similar in some ways to that of a constitutional monarch found in other European states, with the important difference being that the President is elected, and selected based on his or her distinguished reputation. Therefore, the power of daily politics in Germany is concentrated in the position of the Chancellor of Germany with the president acting more as the guardian of the political system, moral authority and identification figure.
Other comparisons might be to a court philosopher, or a 'national conscience'. The President is called on to develop, interpret and communicate a long-term view of trends affecting Germany and its role in the world. Formulating such vision calls for reflection about Germany's past. Recent Presidents have been instrumental in getting Germans to constructively confront their history during the Nazi period, for instance.
De jure, the German Reich did not cease to exist in 1945, but after four years of Allied occupation, three German states were formed inside of Germany as a whole in 1949: the Federal Republic of Germany (then commonly known as West Germany) in the former U.S., and British zones of occupation, the Saar in French zone, until 1957, when it joined the FRG, and the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) in the former Soviet Zone. There continued to be two states on German soil until reunification in 1990.
East Germany established the office of a head of state with the title of President of the Republic (German: Präsident der Republik) in 1949, but abandoned the office with the death of the first president, Wilhelm Pieck, in 1960 in favour of a collective head of state. All government positions of the GDR, including the Presidency, were appointed by the ruling Socialist Unity Party of Germany. De facto the Soviet authorities in Moscow determined who would get the highest offices.
With the promulgation of the Basic Law (a new German constitution) in 1949, the office of Federal President (in German: Bundespräsident) was created in West Germany. Since the reunification of Germany in 1990 this head of state has presided over the whole of Germany.
Under the Basic Law the President was to be elected by a specially convened body called the Federal Assembly (Bundesversammlung) to serve a five-year term. In accordance with Germany's parliamentary system of government, the presidency has been limited by a mixture of law and convention to being a ceremonial position. This is in part due to concerns about the misuse of presidential power in Weimar.
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