Task: songer_r_state

What follows is an opinion from a United States Court of Appeals.
Intervenors who participated as parties at the courts of appeals should be counted as either appellants or respondents when it can be determined whose position they supported. For example, if there were two plaintiffs who lost in district court, appealed, and were joined by four intervenors who also asked the court of appeals to reverse the district court, the number of appellants should be coded as six.
In some cases there is some confusion over who should be listed as the appellant and who as the respondent. This confusion is primarily the result of the presence of multiple docket numbers consolidated into a single appeal that is disposed of by a single opinion. Most frequently, this occurs when there are cross appeals and/or when one litigant sued (or was sued by) multiple litigants that were originally filed in district court as separate actions. The coding rule followed in such cases should be to go strictly by the designation provided in the title of the case. The first person listed in the title as the appellant should be coded as the appellant even if they subsequently appeared in a second docket number as the respondent and regardless of who was characterized as the appellant in the opinion.
To clarify the coding conventions, consider the following hypothetical case in which the US Justice Department sues a labor union to strike down a racially discriminatory seniority system and the corporation (siding with the position of its union) simultaneously sues the government to get an injunction to block enforcement of the relevant civil rights law. From a district court decision that consolidated the two suits and declared the seniority system illegal but refused to impose financial penalties on the union, the corporation appeals and the government and union file cross appeals from the decision in the suit brought by the government. Assume the case was listed in the Federal Reporter as follows:
United States of America,
Plaintiff, Appellant
v
International Brotherhood of Widget Workers,AFL-CIO
Defendant, Appellee.
International Brotherhood of Widget Workers,AFL-CIO
Defendants, Cross-appellants
v
United States of America.
Widgets, Inc. & Susan Kuersten Sheehan, President & Chairman
of the Board
Plaintiff, Appellants,
v
United States of America,
Defendant, Appellee.
This case should be coded as follows:Appellant = United States, Respondents = International Brotherhood of Widget Workers Widgets, Inc., Total number of appellants = 1, Number of appellants that fall into the category "the federal government, its agencies, and officials" = 1, Total number of respondents = 3, Number of respondents that fall into the category "private business and its executives" = 2, Number of respondents that fall into the category "groups and associations" = 1.
Note that if an individual is listed by name, but their appearance in the case is as a government official, then they should be counted as a government rather than as a private person. For example, in the case "Billy Jones & Alfredo Ruiz v Joe Smith" where Smith is a state prisoner who brought a civil rights suit against two of the wardens in the prison (Jones & Ruiz), the following values should be coded: number of appellants that fall into the category "natural persons" =0 and number that fall into the category "state governments, their agencies, and officials" =2. A similar logic should be applied to businesses and associations. Officers of a company or association whose role in the case is as a representative of their company or association should be coded as being a business or association rather than as a natural person. However, employees of a business or a government who are suing their employer should be coded as natural persons. Likewise, employees who are charged with criminal conduct for action that was contrary to the company policies should be considered natural persons.
If the title of a case listed a corporation by name and then listed the names of two individuals that the opinion indicated were top officers of the same corporation as the appellants, then the number of appellants should be coded as three and all three were coded as a business (with the identical detailed code). Similar logic should be applied when government officials or officers of an association were listed by name.
Your specific task is to determine the total number of respondents in the case that fall into the category "state governments, their agencies, and officials". If the total number cannot be determined (e.g., if the respondent is listed as "Smith, et. al." and the opinion does not specify who is included in the "et.al."), then answer 99.

OPINION
Before TRASR, GOODWIN and WALLACE, Circuit Judges.
WALLACE, Circuit Judge:
Hannon, in propria persona, sued Security National Bank for 12 separate violations of section 127 of the Truth in Lending Act of 1968, 15 U.S.C. § 1637, alleging that the bank failed to disclose on the 12 monthly Master Charge statements sent to him in the previous year the annual percentage rates of interest charged on overdue balances. The district judge granted Hannon’s motion for summary judgment, awarding $1200 damages plus costs but not allowing attorney’s fees. From this part of the judgment he appeals and we affirm.
At the time this suit was brought, the Truth in Lending Act provided for civil liability as follows:
Except as otherwise provided in this section, any creditor who fails in connection with any consumer credit transaction to disclose to any person any information required under this part to be disclosed to that person is liable to that person in an amount equal to the sum of
(1) twice the amount of the finance charge in connection with the transaction, except that the liability under this paragraph shall not be less than $100 nor greater than $1,000; and
(2) in the case of any successful action to enforce the foregoing liability, the costs of the action together with a reasonable attorney’s fee as determined by the court.
15 U.S.C. § 1640(a) (1974), as amended, 15 U.S.C. § 1640(a) (Supp.1976). From the time this case was filed until the lower court’s decision, Hannon was a law school graduate but was not licensed to practice law. Even though Hannon did not retain an attorney and was not an attorney himself, he claims that he is entitled to a reasonable attorney’s fee under the statute because such a rule would effectuate the statute’s purpose of encouraging private enforcement of the law.
We agree that the statute should be liberally construed to encourage private enforcement. Mourning v. Family Publications Service, Inc., 411 U.S. 356, 93 S.Ct. 1652, 36 L.Ed.2d 318 (1973); Ratner v. Chemical Bank New York Trust Co., 329 F.Supp. 270, 280-81 (S.D.N.Y.1971); cf. Newman v. Piggie Park Enterprises, Inc., 390 U.S. 400, 88 S.Ct. 964, 19 L.Ed.2d 1263 (1968) (construing attorney’s fees provision of Civil Rights Act of 1964). However, the question before us is whether that liberal interpretation should be extended to allow recovery of attorney’s fees when no attorney has been retained. The question has added importance due to differing opinions by district courts in this circuit.
The general American rule is that the prevailing party may not recover attorney’s fees absent express provision of a contract or statute or exceptional circumstances warranting the exercise of equitable powers. 6 J. Moore, Federal Practice H54.77[2], at 1703-05 (2d ed. 1948). Increasingly, federal statutes have made attorney’s fees recoverable. E. g., 15 U.S.C. § 15 (suits under the antitrust laws); 17 U.S.C. § 116 (suits under the copyright laws); 29 U.S.C. § 216(b) (certain suits under the Fair Labor Standards Act); 35 U.S.C. § 285 (suits under the patent laws); 42 U.S.C. § 2000a-3(b) (suits under Title II of the Civil Rights Act of 1964); 47 U.S.C. § 206, suits under the Communications Act of 1934); 49 U.S.C. §§ 8, 908(b) (suits under the Interstate Commerce Act). But it is a second and larger step to hold that where, as here, Congress has allowed attorney’s fees, it meant to compensate non-attorneys who represent themselves. No legislative history supporting such an interpretation has been pointed out to us, nor have we discovered any. The only federal case we have found on this issue held that a layman representing himself may not recover under a general statute (Rev.Stat. §§ 823, 824) providing for the allowance of compensation to “attorneys, solicitors, and proctors in the courts of the United States.” Gorse v. Parker, 36 F. 840 (C.C.N.D.Ill.1888).
The purpose behind granting attorney’s fees is to make a litigant whole and to facilitate private enforcement of the Truth in Lending Act. Cf. Newman v. Piggie Park Enterprises, Inc., supra. In this case, there was no financial expenditure for an attorney’s services. Hannon, probably due to his new-found expertise, chose to represent himself. However, he was not an attorney and could not provide attorney services. Had Congress wished to compensate non-attorneys for “services” rendered on their own behalf in pressing their individual claims, it certainly could have done so. Absent such an expression, we cannot rewrite the statute. Although Hannon proved no actual damages, he recovered $1200 in minimum statutory damages plus costs. Under the clear language of the statute, he was not also entitled to attorney’s fees.
AFFIRMED.
. The Fifth Circuit has held that the plaintiff need not be obligated to pay his attorney before statutory attorney’s fees are recoverable. Thus, fees have been awarded directly to legal aid services who have successfully represented plaintiffs without charge in suits under the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Miller v. Amusement Enterprises, Inc., 426 F.2d 534, 538-39 (5th Cir. 1970), and the Truth in Lending Act of 1968, Sellers v. Wollman, 510 F.2d 119, 123 (5th Cir. 1975). The reasoning behind these cases is that where the assistance of an attorney is a practical necessity, Congress did not intend that vindication of the rights guaranteed by statute depend on the plaintiffs having economic resources to retain an attorney or else being compelled to seek out charitable assistance. The payment is made not to the litigants, but directly to the attorney as reimbursement for services actually rendered.
This case gives us no occasion to decide whether the Fifth Circuit rule should be adopted in our circuit, however, because Hannon did not seek an attorney’s services at all. Thus the result in this case is not to deny legal services to a potential plaintiff who does not have the economic resources to retain an attorney and who does not have free legal services available. The result is merely to deny a layman who decides to forego the services of an attorney altogether the windfall of a reimbursement for expenses he never incurred.

Question: What is the total number of respondents in the case that fall into the category "state governments, their agencies, and officials"? Answer with a number.
Answer:

Answer: 0