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:
MAAS et al. v. NATIONAL CASUALTY CO.
No. 4323.
Circuit Court of Appeals, Fourth Circuit.
June 6, 1938.
Before PARKER, NORTHCOTT, and SOPER, Circuit Judges.
Z. Townsend Parks, Jr., and Eldridge Hood Young, both of Baltimore, Md. (Young. & Crothers, of Baltimore, Md., on the brief), for appellants.
William D. MacMillan and W. Randall Compton, both of Baltimore, Md. (Semmes, Bowen & Semmes, of Baltimore, Md., on the brief), for appellee.
NORTHCOTT, Circuit Judge.
This is an action at law brought in the Baltimore City Court of Baltimore, Maryland by. the appellants, F. Leonard Maas and Joseph A. Parker, individually and copartners trading as Maas Construction Company, here referred to as the plaintiffs, against the appellee, the National Casualty Company, a Michigan corporation, here referred to as the defendant. The object of the suit was to recover damages for an alleged libel committed by the defendant.
The action was removed to the District Court of the United States for the District of Maryland. After removal an amended declaration was filed by the plaintiffs and pleas were filed by the defendant, to which plaintiffs replied. On December 16, 1937, the case was called for trial and a jury was selected and sworn. Before any evidence was taken the trial judge suggested that the pleas and replication be withdrawn and that a demurrer to the declaration be filed. To this suggestion the attorneys for both the plaintiffs and the defendant consented and a demurrer to the declaration was filed on behalf of the defendant.
After argument the court sustained the demurrer and entered judgment for the defendant with costs. From this action this appeal was brought.
The declaration alleged that the plaintiffs were engaged in the business of general contractors and had in the year 1934 contracted with the Board of Regents of the University of Maryland for the construction of a building at College Park, Maryland. That the defendant became surety under the contract. That while plaintiffs were engaged in constructing said building the defendant sent to the said Board of Regents the following telegram:
“University of Maryland
“College Park, Maryland.
“Because of no information from Maas indicating that money from Womans Dormitory contract bonded by us is going to be used for no purpose other than payment bills this job we must continue our request that you make no payments to Maas without our consent (stop) Please wire your intention
“National Casualty Company
“E. M. Kincy.”
The declaration further alleged that this telegram was maliciously intended to reflect on plaintiffs’ actions in connection with the contract and caused them to sustain loss and damage to their business and reputation “not only with the said Board of Regents of the University of Maryland but also with the public at large.”
Two questions are presented for consideration. First: Were the words used in the telegram libelous per se? Second: If the words were not libelous per se was there a sufficient allegation of special damage ?
We are of the opinion that both questions must be answered in the negative. The telegram was sent by an officer of the defendant in a perfectly legitimate and proper effort to insure it against loss, as surety on plaintiffs’ bond, and it is only by innuendo that any meaning can be read into the words used that would make them libelous per se. The rule as to innuendoes is well stated by Judge Soper, now of this court, in the case of Phillips et al. v. Union Indemnity Co., 4 Cir., 28 F.2d 701, where he said (page 702) :
“It is familiar law that while the office of the innuendo is to connect the defamatory matter with the other facts set out, so as to show the meaning and application of the charge, it cannot enlarge or restrict the natural meaning of the words, or introduce new matter. It cannot be used to give a forced and unnatural construction and application of the words, but only a reasonable and natural construction and application. * * * Furthermore, since the injurious character of the publication and the harm done to the plaintiff depends upon the manner in which the writing is understood by those to whom it is uttered, it must be read and construed in the sense in which the reader would ordinarily understand it; and if, when thus considered, it cannot reasonably be interpreted as defamatory, it will not serve as a basis for the action. Washington Post Co. v. Chaloner, 250 U.S. 290, 39 S.Ct. 448, 63 L.Ed. 987; Baker v. Warner, 231 U.S. [588], 594, 34 S.Ct. 175, 58 L.Ed. 384.”
See, also, Flaks v. Clark, 143 Md. 377, 122 A. 383; Newbold v. J. M. Bradstreet & Sons, 57 Md. 38, 40 Am.Rep. 426; Stannard v. Wilcox & Gibbs Sewing Mach. Co., 118 Md. 151, 84 A. 335, 42 L.R.A.,N.S., 515, Ann.Cas.1914B, 709.
There is no charge in the telegram that plaintiffs were doing anything illegal or anything they did not have a right to do under, their building contract and no dishonest or improper motive is imputed to them.
It is well settled that the question whether the words are libelous per se is one of law for the court (Phillips v. Union Indemnity Co., supra, and authorities there cited) and it is only when the language is susceptible of two meanings that the ques-lion is one for the jury. Here the words used are plain and unambiguous and do not support the innuendo as claimed by the plaintiffs.
It is apparent from a reading of the declaration that there is no adequate allegation of special damages. The rule is stated in 86 A.L.R. 848 as follows:
“In a great number of cases it has been held that, where the plaintiff alleges special damage by reason of the defamatory publication, which, although it is not actionable per se, damages him in his business, trade, or profession, the loss of customers, contract, sales, patients, or clients, the particular contracts, sales, customers, patients or clients lost must be alleged as a prerequisite to recovery of special damages.”
See, also, Pollard v. Lyon, 91 U.S. 225, 23 L.Ed. 308; 37 C.J. 38.
The demurrer was properly sustained and the judgment of the court below is affirmed.
Affirmed.

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.

Choices:

Answer: 1