Task: songer_realapp

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.
Your task is to determine whether or not the formally listed appellants in the case are the "real parties." That is, are they the parties whose real interests are most directly at stake? (e.g., in some appeals of adverse habeas corpus petition decisions, the respondent is listed as the judge who denied the petition, but the real parties are the prisoner and the warden of the prison) (another example would be "Jones v A 1990 Rolls Royce" where Jones is a drug agent trying to seize a car which was transporting drugs - the real party would be the owner of the car). For cases in which an independent regulatory agency is the listed appellant, the following rule was adopted: If the agency initiated the action to enforce a federal rule or the agency was sued by a litigant contesting an agency action, then the agency was coded as a real party. However, if the agency initially only acted as a forum to settle a dispute between two other litigants, and the agency is only listed as a party because its ruling in that dispute is at issue, then the agency is considered not to be a real party. For example, if a union files an unfair labor practices charge against a corporation, the NLRB hears the dispute and rules for the union, and then the NLRB petitions the court of appeals for enforcement of its ruling in an appeal entitled "NLRB v Widget Manufacturing, INC." the NLRB would be coded as not a real party. Note that under these definitions, trustees are usually "real parties" and parents suing on behalf of their children and a spouse suing on behalf of their injured or dead spouse are also "real parties."

PER CURIAM:
A collision occurred in the Kill Van Kull between the M/S Philippine President Osmena, an ocean-going vessel, and Barge Red Star No. 70. The Barge, together with Barge Red Star No. 72 and Barge Red Star No. 73 were being towed by the Tug Catherine. The two first-named barges, loaded, were on the tug’s starboard side, one behind the other, and were held to have been damaged in the collision. The Osmena also suffered damage. No. 73, light, was on the tug’s port side and was not found to have been damaged.
The owners of the barges filed their libel against the tug and its owners and the Osmena and its operator. The owner and operator of the Osmena in a separate proceeding filed their libel against the tug and its owners.
The two proceedings were consolidated below and, after hearing, Judge Bonsai in a careful opinion held that the Tug Catherine was at fault and that her fault was the sole cause of the collision. Damages were awarded against the owners of the tug for the loss found to have been suffered by the owners of barges 70 and 72 and an award was made to the owner and operator of the Osmena for the damages occasioned to the Osmena.
The Catherine appeals in each case and the two appeals were consolidated for action in this court.
The barge owners cross-appealed in their case against the Catherine. They maintain that the damage award to them was inadequate, for the district court denied their claims to be recompensed for alleged business losses caused by the detention of the barges following the collision.
We agree with the results reached by the judge below and we affirm the judgment entered in the district court on Judge Bonsai’s opinion.

Question: Are the formally listed appellants in the case the "real parties", that is, are they the parties whose real interests are most directly at stake?
A. both 1st and 2nd listed appellants are real parties (or only one appellant, and that appellant is a real party)
B. the 1st appellant is not a real party
C. the 2nd appellant is not a real party
D. neither the 1st nor the 2nd appellants are real parties
E. not ascertained
Answer:

Answer: B