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.

Opinion:
MELLING v. GORDON et al.
(Court of Appeals of District of Columbia.
Submitted March 10, 1925.
Decided April 6, 1925.)
No. 1727.
1. Patents <§=II2(3) — Question of patentability in light of prior art is not before Court of Appeals on appeal in interference proceeding.
Question of patentability in light of prior art is not before Court of Appeals on appeal in interference proceeding.
2. Patents <§;=49 — Evidence as to cost, sales, and efficiency of patent held to show operativeness.
Evidence as to cost of production and sales of machines, consisting of lathe for turning out irregular forms, specifically the cam shafts of automobile engines, and evidence that such ma • chines turned out 80 to 90 per cent, of commercially usable shafts, held to show operativeness.
3. Patents <§=47 — Superiority of subsequent invention held not to deprive owners of prior invention from right to make counts of interference.
That invention possessed superiority in wider range of utility and in better work held insufficient to deprive holders of prior patent from right to make counts of interference.
Appeal from Commissioner of Patents.
Inteiierenee proceeding between Herman W. Melling and Charles Gordon and Alfred W. Redlin.' From a decision awarding priority to Gordon and Redlin, Melling appeals.
Affirmed.
F. L. Chappell and O. A. Earl, both of Kalamazoo, Mich., for appellant.
W. G. Henderson, of Washington, D. C., and E. H. Bottum and J.'W. Michael, both of Milwaukee, Wis., for .appellees.
Before MARTIN, Chief Justice, and ROBB and VAN ORSDEL, Associate Justices.
VAN ORSDEL, Associate Justice.
This appeal is from the decision of the Commissioner of Patents, awarding priority of invention to appellees, Gordon and Redlin. The issue is in 3 counts, described in the opinion of the Examiner in Chief as follows:
“The subject-matter of the interference is a lathe for turning irregular forms, specifically the cam shafts of automobile engines. In the embodiment of invention disclosed in. the Melling application involved in interference, the cutter is carried by a swinging lever mounted on a reciprocating carriage, movable in a plant transverse to the longitudinal axis of the work holder. This movement is controlled by a pattern cam, which is a replica of the cam,to be formed by the cutter, both as to size and outline. The movement of the cutter-carrying lever is controlled by an additional cam. In the Gordon and Redlin machine, disclosed in the application involved in interference, the main cutter-carrying member is a swinging cam-controlled lever. The cam which moves the lever towards the work is not a replica of the cam to be formed. The movement of the cutter carrier proper is controlled by a second cam-actuated lever having a segmental rack engaging teeth on the cutter carrier and moving the cutter in an are as the formation of the cam progresses.”
The testimony discloses that there is no case of priority of invention here presented. Melling admits that he took no steps toward making the invention until after he had seen, at the factory of the Jackson Motor Shaft Company, in Jackson, Mich., a Gordon and Redlin machine, which was constructed in accordance with the disclosure of their application involved in this interference. Indeed, Melling admits that all dates named in his preliminary statement are subsequent to the time when he saw the Gordon and Redlin machine.
• Melling, however, moved to dissolve the interference on two grounds: First, that Gordon and Redlin had no right to make the counts of the interference; second, on the ground that the issue is unpatentable in view of the prior art. On these issues Melling was defeated in all the tribunals of the Patent Offiee.
We will not stop here to consider the question of patentability in the light of the prior art. That matter is not for our consideration in an interference proceeding. This narrows the ease, therefore, to the question of the right of Gordon and Redlin to make the counts of the interference. The issue is stated in three counts. Count 1 was formulated by the Examiner, and based upon a claim originally appearing in the Melling application. Counts 2 and 3 are claims originally made by Gordon and Redlin.
On the question of inoperativeness the evidence discloses that Gordon and Redlin manufactured and sold quite a number of machines in accordance with the disclosure of their application. The price of the machines was $5,000 each. The expense of producing the machines, and the fact that a number of machines were sold and put into operation by various automobile manufacturers, is significant as bearing upon -the question of operativeness.
The record discloses that Gordon and Redlin encountered difficulty in making their machines operate satisfactorily from a commercial standpoint, in that only from 80 to 90 per cent, of the cam shafts turned out were commercially usable. It further appears that there was excessive waste or scrap in the manufacture of the machines. The scrap, as one witness testified, amounted to from 10 to 12 per cent., and another witness estimated as high as 20 per cent. By scrap was meant that this percentage of shafts was not turned out with sufficient accuracy to be used commercially. We, however, agree with the Board of Examiners in Chief that, “if the Gordon and Redlin machine would turn out from 80 to 90 per cent, of commercially usable cam shafts, we think this fact indicates strongly that the machine was operative, although possibly not commercially practicable on the type of cams being turned. There is a clearly recognized distinction between inoperativeness and commercial impracticability.” This defect, however, was largely overcome by a second machine constructed by Gordon and Redlin.
Melling’s whole case resolves itself into an attempt to secure an award of priority on the alleged superiority of his invention over that of Gordon and Redlin, but neither the fact, that Melling may be able to manufacture shafts with less waste than Gordon and Redlin, or that his machine may have a wider range of utility, are sufficient to deprive Gordon and Redlin of making tho counts of tho interference. Neither wider range of utility nor better work are sufficient to deprive Gordon and Redlin of their right to the claims in issue.
The tribunals of the Patent Office were unanimous in sustaining the operatiVeness of the Gordon and Redlin machine, and with their reasoning and conclusions we fully agree.
The decision of the Commissioner of Patents is affirmed.

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

Choices:

Answer: 1