Editing President of Germany (section)

==Reserve powers==
According to article 81 of the German constitution, the president can declare a "Legislation Emergency" and allow the federal government and the Bundesrat to enact laws without the approval of the Bundestag. They also have important decisive power regarding the appointment of a chancellor who was elected by plurality only, or the dissolution of the Bundestag under certain circumstances.

It is also theoretically possible, albeit a drastic step which has not happened since 1949, that the president refuses to sign legislation merely because they disagree with its content, thus vetoing it, or refuse to approve a cabinet appointment.<ref>Heinrich Wilms: Staatsrecht I: Staatsorganisationsrecht unter Berücksichtigung der Föderalismusreform. Stuttgart 2007. pp. 201 ff. (German)</ref> In all cases in which a bill was not signed by the federal president, all presidents have claimed that the bill in question was manifestly unconstitutional. For example, in the autumn of 2006, President Horst Köhler did so twice within three months. Also, in some cases, a president has signed a law while asking that the political parties refer the case to the [[Federal Constitutional Court]] in order to test the law's constitutionality.