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:
EGAN v. UNITED STATES.
No. 5556.
Circuit Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit.
Nov. 21, 1935.
Rehearing Denied Dec. 28, 1935.
Edward H. S. Martin, of Chicago, Ill., for appellant.
M. L. Igoe, U. S. Atty., of Chicago, Ill., Will G. Beardslee, Director, Bureau of War Risk Litigation, of Washington, D. C, and Wilbur C. Pickett and Fendall Marbury, Sp. Assts. to Atty. Gen., for the United States.
Before EVANS and SPARKS, Circuit Judges, and BALTZELL, District Judge.
SPARKS, Circuit Judge.
This is an appeal from an order of the District Court dismissing a suit, brought by appellant’s decedent on his policy of war risk insurance, for want of jurisdiction. It was stipulated in the court below that the cause should be submitted to the court for trial on the issue as to jurisdiction only, and if the decision on that issue should sustain the jurisdiction, then the cause should be tried on the merits at a later date.
The Government filed a motion to dismiss on the ground that there had been no disagreement between the parties as contemplated by section 19 of the World War Veterans’ Act as amended July 3, 1930, 38 U.S.C.A. § 445. In support of this motion it relied on the facts: That the insured filed a claim in the Bureau for the benefits of insurance on July 2, 1931; that no denial of this claim had ever been made by the Director or administrator of the United States Veterans’ Administration or anyone designated by him to deny claims in his behalf; that the present suit was filed on July 1, 1931.
There was no dispute as to the facts on the issue of jurisdiction. Decedent was awarded and paid monthly benefits on account of his alleged total, permanent disability beginning October 25, 1919. These payments were continued until January 25, 1922. On February 24, 1922, the award was terminated by the Director of the United States Veterans’ Bureau. On June 30, 1931, the insured, by letter to the Insurance Claims Council of the Veterans’ Bureau, made claim for benefits from October 25, 1919, to that date, less the monthly installments already paid by the Bureau. He stated in his letter that he made his application on the ground of his total and permanent disability at and ever since that date (October 25, 1919) and requested that if the claim were disallowed, it be forwarded on appeal to the Administrator of Veterans’ Affairs for his ultimate decision on it. This letter was received July 2, 1931. On the preceding day, July 1, the present suit was filed for benefits due from October 25, 1919, to June 25, 1931, less the installments already paid.
Under section 19 of the World War Veterans’ Act as amended July 3, 1930, a claim in writing and a denial of that claim by the director or someone acting in his name on an appeal to him are jurisdictional prerequisites to the filing of a suit for benefits under a policy of war risk insurance. Appellant contends that the fact that total, permanent disability benefits were paid under the policy to her decedent for a period from October, 1919, to January, 1922, is of itself proof that he filed a sufficient claim for such benefits, and that the subsequent discontinuance of such payments is proof of the necessary disagreement as to the claim. We quote from appellant’s brief: “There being no evidence to the contrary, the award and payment of benefits was sufficient evidence to justify a presumption that the veteran had filed a claim therefor. * * * Tt should likewise be presumed that the Director’s denial of the claim and termination of the award was in writing, because, from the nature of the thing, the payments could not have been stopped without written directions to that effect.” We have no right to indulge in any such presumptions where the facts we are thus asked to presume are conditions precedent tc the right of the claimant to maintain the suit. In the petition filed by decedent to start the suit, the only reference to the claim and disagreement are contained in the following paragraph:
“5. That the plaintiff made due proof of said disability to the defendant and demanded payment of the aforesaid amounts and his claim was allowed by the defendant and its agents in that behalf» the United States Veterans Bureau, and monthly installments of said insurance at the rate of * * * were paid * * * until the 25th day of May, 1923. Whereupon the defendant and its agents in that behalf, * * * disagreed with the plaintiff as to his claim for said disability and decided that the plaintiff was no longer totally and permanently disabled and no longer entitled to payment * * * and have wholly failed and refused to pay the said sums of money. * * * ”
We do not agree with appellant that her decedent’s original claim . may constitute the basis for the disagreement 'here alleged to exist. This claim was acted upon by the Bureau favorably to him. Payments were made under it for a period of years. There certainly seems to have been no disagreement in 1919 as to his right to collect benefits. The reason for the subsequent discontinuance of those payments does not appear in the record. No action was taken by the insured when those payments were stopped, and no claim filed until the letter of June 30, 1931, received by the Bureau on July 2, 1931. We think it was necessary for decedent -to file this new claim in order to bring his case before the Director, and that a disagreement arising out of this claim was necessary before the court could assume jurisdiction over it. The disagreement could not be presumed from the mere fact of the discontinuance of payments. The same argument -was made in Smith v. United States (D.C.) 56 F.(2d) 636, 638. There the court said:
“The real difficulty presented by the record in the case at bar is the fact that the claim now presented to the court for adjudication, that is, the claim that the stopping of the payment on the insurance policy was unwarranted and arbitrary and that a disagreement thereby exists, has never in fact been presented to the Bureau, and consequently no jurisdiction to pass on this question is shown by the pleadings in this case.”
Appellant argues that appellee is precluded from raising the question in this court of the absence of a claim in writing and a disagreement on that claim because it failed to raise that question before the trial court.- It appears from the bill of exceptions that the only evidence introduced by decedent was an admission by the parties that the insured was awarded monthly benefits upon his contract on account of his alleged total and permanent disability, received twenty-eight installments of such benefits, after which the award was' terminated. We think such evidence was not sufficient to sustain the jurisdiction of the court, and that the "offer by the Government of the letter of June 30, 1931, to meet such evidence does not preclude it from denying in this court the availability of the original claim alleged to have been filed prior to the awarding of benefits in October, 1919.
Appellant relies upon the reversal of the case of United States v. Earwood (C.C.A.) 71 F.(2d) 507, by the Supreme Court, 294 U.S. 695, 55 S.Ct. 511, 79 L.Ed. 1233, as support for her proposition that a disagreement existing prior to the amendment of 1930, under the law as it then stood, constitutes a sufficient jurisdictional basis for suit commenced subsequent to July 3, 1930. This appears to be a fair interpretation of that decision of the Supreme Court which • is based on an amendment of section 19 of the Veterans’ Act as passed in January, 1935, 38 U.S.C.A. § 445c. This; amendment is as follows:
“A denial of a claim for insurance by the Administrator of Veterans’ Af-. fairs or any employee or agency of the Veterans’ Administration heretofore or hereafter designated therefor by the Administrator shall constitute a disagreement for the purposes of section 19 of the World War Veterans’ Act, 1924, as amended [section 445 of this title].
“This section is made effective as of July 3, 1930, and shall apply to all suits now pending [on January 28, 1935], against the United States under the provisions of section 19 of the World War Veterans’ Act, 1924, as amended [section 445 of this title], and any suit which has been dismissed solely on the ground that a denial as described in this resolution [section] did not constitute a disagreement as defined by section 19 [section 445 of this title], may be reinstat-• ed within three months from January 28, 1935.”
We do not agree that the facts here presented constituted a sufficient denial to furnish the basis for a suit prior to the 1930 amendment.
We find only one case in addition to the Smith Case, supra, in which the facts appear to be in any way analogous to those of the case at bar. That case is United States v. Knoles (C.C.A.) 75 F.(2d) 557. There the insured had been found to be totally and permanently disabled from April, 1919, and awarded benefits from that date to December, 1921, when it was found that he was not totally and permanently disabled, and benefits were terminated and he was notified that he would have to pay premiums on his insurance. Such premiums were paid until 1925. Subsequently he filed suit claiming disability from and after April, 1919. The Government by its answer admitted that the claimant had made his demand, and that the defendant had disagreed with him as to his claim under the insurance. Thus by its answer the Government admitted the existence of the jurisdictional prerequisites and made it unnecessary for the court to decide whether the facts as pleaded by the claimant satisfied those prerequisites. Here, however, the Government has denied the existence of a disagreement, and the only evidence offered by the claimant to prove it is the fact of the discontinuance of benefits. The District Court was correct in its ruling that it had no jurisdiction, and that ruling is accordingly 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: 0