Task: songer_r_fed

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 "the federal government, its 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.

LEVENTHAL, Circuit Judge:
These petitions to review Federal Power Commission certificate orders amount, on analysis, to a challenge to the FPC’s ruling that the underlying contractual arrangements entitled United Gas Pipeline Co. to 120,000 Mcf/d from Humble Oil & Refining Co.’s natural gas production in the Garden City Field, and that this entitlement would be respected even though United later bettered its position in that field, especially in relation to Columbia Gas Transmission Corp. In our view the FPC acted within the permissible range of an administrative agency in both its construction of the contracts, and its certificate order. Taking into account this record, and the way the parties shaped their position before the agency, we cannot condemn the FPC on the ground that the broader non-contractual elements of public interest required a different result. We affirm.
In its order, issued on October 16, 1974, in its Docket C172-674, Texas Gas Exploration Corp., et al., the FPC—
a. Issued certificates authorizing Texas Gas Exploration (Texas Gas), et
al. to sell certain of their gas to United;
b. Held that the contractual and statutory obligations of Humble and Cullen to deliver 120,000 Mcf of gas per day to United from the Garden City Field were not reduced by the volumes sold to United by Texas Gas, et al. under the certificates issued in that order; and
c. Held that Texas Gas et al. could collect only the area rate for “old gas” for the volumes sold under those certificates.
The facts are available from the opinion of Administrative Law Judge Kanell, adopted by the FPC, and will not therefore be restated at any length. It suffices to say that on June 15, 1958, Humble and Cullen entered into a contract with United giving United the right to purchase all of their Garden City Field gas. In 1963, Humble and Cullen desired to sell some of their Garden City gas to Columbia Gas, and amended their contract with United on June 18, 1963. The 1963 amendment, sometimes referred to by the parties as a “carveout agreement,” provided insofar as pertinent:
1. Humble and Cullen were obligated to deliver to United a maximum of 120,000 Mcf of gas per day, (this freed any excess to be sold to Columbia.)
2. The maximum daily delivery obligation of 120,000 Mcf would be reduced by any volumes received by United under “contracts as now in effect with Buyer’s [United’s] other suppliers” in the Garden City Field.
3. Humble and Cullen could meet their daily delivery obligation to United by delivering their own gas or other gas from the Garden City Field which either Humble or Cullen “shall from time to time have the right to market or dispose of for others”.
On June 28, 1963, Humble and Columbia executed an agreement which provided that Humble would warrant delivery of 6.1 trillion cubic feet (Tcf) of gas to Columbia from a number of fields. Humble further agreed that a portion of its Garden City Field gas, over and above the volumes required to fulfill its obligations to United, would be delivered toward the 6.1 Tcf. On the same day Cullen also entered into a contract to sell Columbia a portion of its excess gas, i. e., Garden City Field gas in excess of that required to meet its obligation to United.
Between 1963 and 1971, Cullen had the right to market Garden City Field gas for Texas Gas and others, and delivered their gas to satisfy part of its obligation to United under the 1963 amendatory contract. These authorizations were revocable. Humble never had the right to market the gas of Texas Gas. On May 2, 1971, Cullen obtained small producer certificates, and notified Texas Gas et al. as of May 2, 1971, it would no longer market their gas. Texas Gas et al. thereupon entered into negotiations with United that culminated in 1972 contracts to sell to United 8,400 Mcf/d out of the Garden City Field gas formerly marketed for them by Cullen. When the amounts of those deliveries were deducted by Humble from the amount it delivered to United, United complained to the FPC and sought a declaratory ruling as to the meaning of the contract.
The proceeding before the Federal Power Commission required the Commission to determine the validity of United’s complaint that it was entitled to 120,000 Mcf/d from Cullen and Humble under the 1963 agreement. Humble took the position that the contract, properly interpreted, permitted it to deduct from the 120,000 Mcf/d obligation such additional amounts as United might obtain from other suppliers in the Garden City Field who had formerly supplied gas to Cullen as their marketing agent for sale to United instead of contracting directly with United. The Administrative Law Judge construed the contract to agree with the interpretation advanced by United, and also accepted by Cullen, that the clause providing for deduction of volumes received by United under “contracts as now in effect with Buyer’s other suppliers” referred to amounts obtained by United from British Petroleum and Gulf, the suppliers in the Garden City Field with which it had contracts in effect on June 18, 1963 (see note 3). Humble did not petition for review of the adverse ruling.
Columbia’s petition to the FPC for review took the position previously advanced by Humble. The FPC adopted the construction of the contract set forth by the Administrative Law Judge. We affirm.
The FPC’s interpretation of the contract is in accordance with its literal terms, and is supported by a plausible explanation of the intendment of the parties. We would likely have reached the same interpretation ourselves, but should in addition note that there is room, in review of administrative agencies, for some deference to their views even on matters of law like the meaning of contracts, as on the meaning of statutes, where the understanding of the documents involved is enhanced by technical knowledge of industry conditions and practices. See Gulf States Utilities Co. v. Federal Power Commission, 171 U.S.App.D.C. 57, 518 F.2d 450, 457 (1975).
Columbia advances the separate contention that the FPC’s ruling amounts to permitting United to take the 120,000 Mcf/d from Humble plus up to 8,400 Mcf/d from Texas Gas et a 1. — and thus to take more from the field than was previously the situation. This, says, Columbia, can only be done in a proceeding under § 7(b) of the Natural Gas Act, in which Texas Gas seeks abandonment as to supply to Columbia, as well as the certification under 7(c) of its supply to United. And this can only be done in a comparative proceeding which takes into account the large elements of public interest inherent in shifting entitlements to gas supply.
Where there is an abandonment or curtailment of service, the Commission has an obligation to consider not only the contract situation but larger elements of public interest, including the entire situation of the pipelines competing for purchase. Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Corp. v. FPC, 160 U.S.App. D.C. 1, 488 F.2d 1325 (1973), cert. denied sub nom. Natural Gas Pipeline Co. v. Transcontinental Pipe Line Corp., 417 U.S. 921, 94 S.Ct. 2629, 41 L.Ed.2d 226 (1974); Michigan Consolidated Gas Co. v. FPC, 108 U.S.App.D.C. 409, 283 F.2d 204, cert. denied, 364 U.S. 913, 81 S.Ct. 276, 5 L.Ed.2d 227 (1960), cited in Transcontinental Gas, 160 U.S.App.D.C. at 5, 488 F.2d 1325. But the present case and record was not presented in these terms, as a comparative case or a broad public interest question. The proceeding was shaped as one involving a contract interpretation. In the proceeding before the FPC, Columbia tendered no evidence bearing on broad public interest questions, such as the comparative position of the United and Columbia pipelines, or even on whether its overall gas entitlement would fall in fact. The case was one involving an extremely modest amount, in comparison with supplies going to Columbia from Humble and to United. Columbia’s counsel says the party proposing the application has the burden of proof. But the FPC can give some presumptive weight to contract arrangements, as Transco recognizes (see 160 U.S.App.D.C. at 5, 488 F.2d at 1329). Columbia should have offered some reasoning as to why the contracts should be rejected.
Putting formality aside, and looking to broader issues, there is merit in principle that the overall “public interest,” and not mere contract arrangement, should govern whenever there is a considered challenge to what is in fact a transfer of supply from one pipeline to another. That public interest background can be assured in the 7(c) proceeding to certificate the new purchaser. Again, since the volume of gas involved is relatively small and the parties did not present the broader public interest question to the Commission, we do not on this record fault the Commission for taking and deciding the case as the parties laid it before them. See FPC v. Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Corp., 423 U.S. 326, 96 S.Ct. 579, 46 L.Ed.2d 533 (1976).
Columbia accused the FPC of inconsistency, in that it recognized that Texas Gas et al. must be treated as producers already engaged in the pertinent supply arrangement, for it held Texas Gas to a flowing gas rate, and did not permit it to charge the rate set for new gas. But the ruling that Texas Gas had dedicated its gas to interstate commerce, for rate purposes, does not mean the gas had been contractually dedicated to United.
Taking the case as it was shaped by the parties, we cannot say that the FPC was faithless to its obligation to consider the public interest.
Affirmed.
. Texas Gas et al. includes Texas Gas, Gulf Oil Corporation (Gulf) and Southern Natural Gas Company (Southern).
. “Humble” is retained throughout although Humble Oil & Refining Co. was succeeded by Exxon Corp.
. As of this June 18, 1963, amendment, United was also purchasing Garden City gas from British American and Gulf under outstanding contracts.
. The contract was with Columbia’s predecessor, namely United Fuel Gas Company.
. Pursuant to FPC Order 428, 18 C.F.R. 157.40.
. United thus contended that the volumes of gas furnished to it by Texas, Gulf and Southern should be excluded from the calculation of its 120,000 Mcf daily entitlement from Cullen and Humble. Any Garden City gas obtained under its contracts with British Petroleum and Gulf, however, would be included in the 120,-000 Mcf calculation.
. We do not question the standing of Columbia to raise the question, nor did the FPC, for the more gas United has a right to get from Humble-Cullen under its 1963 contract, the less gas Columbia has a right to demand under its 1963 contractual right to take what is left after the sellers satisfy the contractual commitments to United.

Question: What is the total number of respondents in the case that fall into the category "the federal government, its agencies, and officialss"? Answer with a number.
Answer:

Answer: 1