Task: songer_appbus

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 "private business and its executives". 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.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge ROBB.
ROBB, Circuit Judge:
The petitioner Wolfsburger TransportGesellschaft (WOBTRANS) challenges an order of the Federal Maritime Commission approving an Agreement adopted by the Pacific Maritime Association (PMA). The Agreement provides for an assessment on cargo entering or leaving ports on the Pacific Coast. In particular, WOBTRANS objects to the assessment on automobiles and its impact on the handling of Volkswagen automobiles. The present case is a continuation of the litigation begun in Volkswagenwerk Aktiengesellschaft v. FMC, 390 U.S. 261, 88 S.Ct. 929, 19 L.Ed.2d 1090 (1968) (Volkswagen).
PMA, the intervenor here, is a corporation composed principally of stevedore companies and steamship lines and their agents doing business on the west coast of the United States. Its principal function is to represent its members in negotiations with various maritime unions, among them the International Longshoremens and Warehousemens Union (ILWU) and to establish policy for its members in matters involving labor and labor controversy. WOBTRANS is a corporation organized and existing under the laws of the Federal Republic of Germany with its principal place of business in Wolfsburg, Germany. It operates vessels engaged in the transportation of vehicles from Germany to the Pacific coast ports, among other places. The cargo is largely if not exclusively Volkswagen automobiles. Although WOBTRANS is not a member of PMA the stevedores handling the WOB-TRANS cargo are members and accordingly are assessed by PMA on the automobiles handled by them.
The purpose of the PMA Agreement is to compensate west coast longshoremen for loss of employment caused by the introduction of mechanical labor-saving devices and the elimination of certain restrictive work practices. To this end the Agreement provides a Pay Guarantee Plan to be funded by assessments on cargo loaded and unloaded at west coast ports. Under the Agreement the amount or rate of the assessment varies, according to the benefit from the Agreement thought to be obtained by carriers in handling various types of cargo. Thus, the tax imposed on automobiles is one and one-half times the assessment on break-bulk cargo, the theory being that carriers of automobiles have greatly benefited from a technique known as Roll-on/Roll-off (Ro/Ro).
Pursuant to section 15 of the Shipping Act, 46 U.S.C. § 814, the Commission approved the Agreement. The petitioner contends, however, that the Agreement violates sections 16 and 17 of the Act, 46 U.S.C. §§ 815, 816, because the assessment on automobiles is unreasonably high and discriminatory with relation to the assessment on other categories of cargo. WOB-TRANS says there is no evidence that other favored cargo benefits less, or that the assessment on automobiles is the fairest that could be devised.
The Department of Justice, representing the United States as a statutory respondent, has filed a brief contending that on the basis of the Commission’s decision it is impossible to determine whether the Commission’s conclusion is reasonable and supported by substantial evidence. Accordingly the Department urges that the case be remanded to the Commission for additional findings.
The law of this case has been fully explicated by the Supreme Court in the Volkswagen case, supra, and by this court in Transamerican Trailer Transport, Inc. v. FMC, 160 U.S.App.D.C. 351, 492 F.2d 617 (1974). Briefly, the question is whether the Agreement imposing the assessment on automobiles is the fairest that could be devised, and whether the charge levied is reasonably related to the benefits received by the automobile shippers. That substantial benefits have been received is not enough; there must be substantial evidence that the charges “are as appropriately proportioned as would be feasible”. Accordingly, the disposition of this case depends upon the answer to a simple question: Is there substantial evidence in the record which supports the disparity between the rate of assessment on automobiles and the rate applied to other cargo? We think the answer must be in the negative.
The Commission reasoned:
. the comparison most relevant in determining the reasonableness of the assessment on automobiles is its relationship to the assessment on breakbulk cargo, which pays the lowest per hour cost, has benefited least from mechanization (since it does not utilize Ro/Ro carriage, containerization, or other specialized mechanized handling methods), and thus is least responsible for manhour loss due to mechanization.
(J.A. 182a)
We have searched the record for evidence supporting the Commission’s statement that “breakbulk cargo . . . has benefited least from mechanization”. Our conclusion is that there is no substantial evidence for the proposition that breakbulk cargo has benefited least. There is evidence that break-bulk cargo has indeed received benefits. Thus the record indicates that all categories of cargo have experienced a decrease in manhours used per ton loaded or discharged by reason of elimination of restrictive work practices and the introduction of new cargo handling equipment or methods. (J.A. 545a) Specifically, there are indications that breakbulk carriers have benefited from the elimination of restrictive work practices and the availability of mechanization. Because of ship design or restrictions in certain foreign ports some breakbulk carriers have not used containers, but others have, and thus have enjoyed the benefits available to lift-on/lift-off automobile carriers. (J.A. 502, 505) Except for such inklings the record is silent as to the extent of the benefits accruing to breakbulk cargo; certainly the record is not adequate to determine the degree of those benefits. In these circumstances we cannot say that the Commission reasonably concluded that “the record in this proceeding supports an effective assessment on automobiles of approximately half again that placed on breakbulk cargo.” (J.A. 182a) If it is not known how much breakbulk cargo benefited it is impossible to say that automobiles benefited one and one-half times as much.
Assuming the critical premise that breakbulk cargo has benefited least the Commission has focused on the substantial benefits accruing to automobiles. As the Supreme Court has told us however the question is not whether automobiles have substantially benefited but whether the charges imposed for those benefits are fair and appropriately proportioned in relation to the benefits received and burdens imposed on other cargoes. From the Commission’s opinion and the record as a whole we are unable to discern a reasonable basis for the Commission’s conclusion with respect to automobiles. Accordingly the case is remanded to the Commission for further proceedings to develop a reasonable and understandable comparison between the benefits accruing to breakbulk cargo and those realized by automobiles.
So Ordered.
. Volkswagen, supra, 390 U.S. at 294, 88 S.Ct. at 947 (Harlan, J., concurring).

Question: What is the total number of appellants in the case that fall into the category "private business and its executives"? Answer with a number.
Answer:

Answer: 1