Chancellor of Germany (1949–present) on the recommendation of the chancellor; no parliamentary approval is needed. According to the Basic Law, the chancellor may set the number of cabinet ministers and dictate their specific duties. Chancellor Ludwig Erhard had the largest cabinet, with 22 ministers, in the mid-1960s. Helmut Kohl presided over 17 ministers at the start of his fourth term in 1994; the 2002 cabinet, the second of Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, had 13 ministers, and the Angela Merkel cabinet as of 22 November 2005 had 15. Article 65 of the Basic Law sets forth three principles that define how the executive branch functions: Whenever
Chancellor of Germany (1949–present) President dissolve the "Bundestag". The correct style of address in German is "Herr Bundeskanzler" (male) or "Frau Bundeskanzlerin" (female). Use of the mixed form "Frau Bundeskanzler" was deprecated by the government in 2004 because it is regarded as impolite. Since 2001, the official residence of the Chancellor is the Federal Chancellery ("Bundeskanzleramt") in Berlin. The former seat of the Federal Chancellery, the Palais Schaumburg in the former capital Bonn, now serves as a secondary official seat. The Chancellor's country retreat is Schloss Meseberg in the state of Brandenburg. Holding the third-highest state office available within the Federal Republic of Germany,