Task: songer_appnatpr

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 appellants in the case that fall into the category "natural persons". If the total number cannot be determined (e.g., if the appellant is listed as "Smith, et. al." and the opinion does not specify who is included in the "et.al."), then answer 99.

BUTZNER, Circuit Judge:
Stanley Davis appeals the dismissal of his complaint pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 41(b) for failure to prosecute. We affirm.
Davis, who was then confined in the Maryland House of Correction, filed a complaint by counsel on October 7, 1975, alleging that he had been denied essential medical treatment for a hip injury received before his incarceration. He sought damages and an injunction preventing further deprivations of his constitutional and statutory rights, and he immediately applied for a preliminary injunction.
When the district court heard the request for a preliminary injunction on October 17, 1975, the prison officials agreed to give Davis the necessary treatment. From that time forward, Davis was repeatedly scheduled for diagnostic examinations by specialists. He generally failed to cooperate with the doctors and the officials who were attempting to arrange treatment for his injury. In late 1976, the parties agreed that Davis would be operated upon by a private surgeon of his choice. However, Davis failed to make the arrangements for the operation. Again and again, the district court requested information, urged Davis’s counsel to proceed with his damages claim, and warned that the case would be dismissed unless the plaintiff took action. However, the case essentially lay dormant from January, 1976, until October 20, 1977. On that date, the district court dismissed the suit for want of prosecution.
The district court had authority under Rule 41(b) to dismiss the case with prejudice, on its own motion, for failure to prosecute. Link v. Wabash Railroad Co., 370 U.S. 626, 629-31, 82 S.Ct. 1386, 8 L.Ed.2d 734 (1962). The sole issue, therefore, is whether it abused its discretion. National Hockey League v. Metropolitan Hockey Club, Inc., 427 U.S. 639, 642, 96 S.Ct. 2778, 49 L.Ed.2d 747 (1976).
A dismissal with prejudice is a harsh sanction which should not be invoked lightly in view .of “the sound public policy of deciding cases on their merits.” Reizakis v. Loy, 490 F.2d 1132, 1135 (4th Cir. 1974); 9 Wright & Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure § 2370, at 216-17. Against this policy, the district court must balance considerations of sound judicial administration, applying four criteria: (1) the degree of personal responsibility on the part of the plaintiff; (2) the amount of prejudice to the defendant caused by the delay; (3) the presence or absence of a “ ‘drawn out history’ of ‘deliberately proceeding in a dilatory fashion;’ ” and (4) the effectiveness of sanctions less drastic than dismissal. McCargo v. Hedrick, 545 F.2d 393, 396 (4th Cir. 1976).
Applying these standards, we conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion in dismissing this case. Davis is not blameless. On November 10,1975, he refused to keep an appointment for diagnostic tests because he could not take his radio with him. Three days later he declined to discuss his condition with an orthopedist. This and other obstructive conduct on Davis’s part distinguishes this case from our decisions setting aside' dismissals on which Davis relies.
In addition, the record amply supports a finding that there was a long history of delay. The district court found that Davis’s counsel “steadfastly refused to take the initiative in this litigation.” For example, on several occasions, letters from the court to the attorney went unanswered, and the court found it necessary to make repeated requests for information. When information was finally given, it was incomplete. The district court held that the appellant could not shift the blame for these deficiencies to the prison officials, and this conclusion is fully supported by the evidence.
On appeal, counsel for Davis contends that he did not press the proceedings because he understood that they were to be suspended until after the surgery. This assertion is rebutted by the fact that the district court warned Davis’s counsel that the action would be dismissed if it were not promptly prosecuted. Moreover, ten days after Davis filed suit, he obtained full assurance of adequate medical treatment, and there has been no showing of bad faith in the implementation of that promise. The deprivation of Davis’s right to medical care, if any, came to a halt at that time, and there is no basis in the record for an assessment of damages beyond that point. Consequently, there was no justification for delaying trial of Davis’s damage claim for nearly two years to the detriment of the prison officials.
The United States District Court in Maryland has a crowded docket. Appropriate sanctions must be available to prevent its work from being impeded by the type of conduct disclosed by this record. Referring to involuntary dismissals, the Supreme Court recently observed in National Hockey League v. Metropolitan Hockey Club, Inc., 427 U.S. 639, 643, 96 S.Ct. 2778, 2781, 49 L.Ed.2d 747 (1976):
[T]he most severe in the spectrum of sanctions provided by statute or rule must be available to- the district court in appropriate cases, not merely to penalize those whose conduct, may be deemed to warrant such a sanction, but to deter those who might be tempted to such conduct in the absence of such a deterrent.
The judgment of the district court is affirmed.
. Davis has since been released from custody.
. Dove v. Codesco, 569 F.2d 807 (4th Cir. 1978); McCargo v. Hedrick, 545 F.2d 393 (4th Cir. 1976); Bush v. United States Postal Service, 496 F.2d 42 (4th Cir. 1974); Reizakis v. Loy, 490 F.2d 1132 (4th Cir. 1974).

Question: What is the total number of appellants in the case that fall into the category "natural persons"? Answer with a number.
Answer:

Answer: 1