1976 German Federal Election
3 October 1976 · The Bonn Republic · 496 seats, 249 for a majority
The coalition of the SPD and the FDP wanted to be re-elected, with the SPD, since 1974 led by Helmut Schmidt, the party's candidate for Chancellor. The CDU and the CSU tried to achieve an absolute majority of the votes to make CDU chairman Helmut Kohl Chancellor, but they fell six seats short of their target.
Chancellor before
Helmut Schmidt
SPD
Chancellor (continued)
Helmut Schmidt
SPD
Largest force
CDU/CSU
243 of 496 seats
Turnout
90.7%
The result
| Share of the chamber | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CDU/CSU | Helmut Kohl | 243 | +18 | 18.394.801 | 48.6% | +3.7 | |
| SPD | Helmut Schmidt | 214 | -16 | 16.099.019 | 42.6% | -3.2 | |
| FDP | Hans-Dietrich Genscher | 39 | -2 | 2.995.085 | 7.9% | -0.5 |