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:
AMERICAN FEDERATION OF GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES (AFL-CIO), LOCAL 1904, AFGE (AFL-CIO), LOCAL 1498, AFGE (AFL-CIO), et al., Appellants, v. Stanley R. RESOR, Secretary of the Army, et al.
No. 18952.
United States Court of Appeals, Third Circuit.
Argued March 5, 1971.
Decided May 24, 1971.
Joseph Meehan, Long Branch, N. J., for appellants.
James C. Hair, Jr., Dept. of Justice, Washington, D. C., for appellees.
Before HASTIE, Chief Judge, and ADAMS and GIBBONS, Circuit Judges.
OPINION OF THE COURT
ADAMS, Circuit Judge.
This case concerns the application of the doctrine of exhaustion of administrative remedies to a suit challenging demotions and discharges by a governmental agency.
The plaintiffs are civilians employed by the United States Army Electronics Command (ECOM) at Fort Monmouth, New Jersey and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and their union, the American Federation of Government Employees (AFL-CIO). Early in March, 1970, ECOM decided to reduce the number of its employees at Fort Monmouth and Philadelphia. Pursuant to such decision, ECOM notified approximately 4,000 employees that in May, 1970 the number of civilians employed by ECOM would be substantially reduced. In May, 1970, the individual plaintiffs and the union filed a complaint in the District Court for the District of New Jersey seeking preliminary and mandatory injunctions to prevent the discharges and demotions contemplated by ECOM. The plaintiffs charged that various statutes, civil service regulations, army regulations, and executive orders would be violated by the proposed reduction in the number of government employees working for ECOM, and by the substitution for them of military personnel and independent contractors.
The primary responsibility for formulating and enforcing standards relating to the release and demotion of government employees lies with the Civil Service Commission. 5 U.S.C.A. § 3502(a); (b). Pursuant to the authority granted by Congress, the Civil Service Commission requires that an employee before being released or demoted must be notified of such action “at least thirty full days, but not more than ninety full days before the effective date” of his separation or change in status. 5 C.F.R. § 351.801-807. After receiving notice of the proposed action, the employee may appeal to. the Civil Service Commission. 5 C.F.R. § 351.901. If the affected employee is dissatisfied with the initial Commission action, he may appeal to the Board of Appeals and Review, 5 C.F.R. § 772.307. Finally, an employee may petition the Civil Service Commissioners to reopen and reconsider the decision of the Board of Appeals and Review. 5 C.F.R. § 772.308.
Pursuant to the congressional direction of 5 U.S.C.A. § 3502(a), the Civil Service Commission has provided regulations controlling the procedures by which the government may reduce its civilian work force. These regulations provide criteria for assigning relative retention standing to individual employees and for the establishment of competitive areas within which the assigned retention standing operate to regulate the order for dismissing employees. 5 C.F.R. Part 351.
The District Court did not err in declining to decide the substantive allegations made by the plaintiffs because, although administrative remedies have been pursued by all the individual plaintiffs, the administrative procedures have not been exhausted. The general rule regarding the requirement of exhaustion of remedies is clear — when Congress has provided an administrative procedure which is capable of resolving a controversy such procedure must be utilized. It is only after the final administrative decision that the aggrieved parties may invoke the jurisdiction of the courts, e. g. Aircraft & Diesel Corp. v. Hirsch, 331 U.S. 752, 67 S.Ct. 1493, 91 L.Ed. 1796 (1947); Hills v. Eisenhart, 256 F.2d 609 (9th Cir. 1958); Burns v. McCrary, 229 F.2d 286 (2nd Cir. 1956). For the courts to act prematurely, prior to the final decision of the appropriate administrative agency, would raise a serious question regarding the doctrine of the separation of powers, and in any event would violate a congressional decision that the present controversy be initially considered by the Civil Service Commission.
As explained by the Supreme Court in Aircraft & Diesel Corp.,
“The very purpose of providing either an exclusive or an initial and preliminary administrative determination is to secure the administrative judgment either, in the one case, in substitution for judicial decision or, in the other, as foundation for or perchance to make unnecessary later judicial proceedings. Where Congress has clearly commanded that administrative judgment be taken initially or exclusively, the courts have no lawful function to anticipate the administrative decision with their own, * * *” 331 U.S. at 767, 67 S.Ct. at 1500.
To be sure, as with most general rules of decision, there are exceptions. Thus, if the prescribed administrative procedure is clearly shown to be inadequate to prevent irreparable injury, or when there is a clear and unambiguous statutory violation, then a court need not defer decision until the conclusion of the administrative inquiry. Aircraft & Diesel Corp., supra, at 773, 67 S.Ct. 1493; Fitzpatrick v. Snyder, 220 F.2d 522, 525 (1st Cir. 1955), cert. denied 349 U.S. 946, 75 S.Ct. 875, 99 L.Ed. 1272; Wettre v. Hague, 168 F.2d 825 (1st Cir. 1952). Shargel v. Hollis, 120 F.Supp. 814 (S.D.N.Y.1954); Reeber v. Rossell, 91 F.Supp. 108 (S.D.N.Y.1950).
The plaintiffs contend that their complaint presents allegations sufficient to justify the application of this exception to the exhaustion of remedies doctrine. However, the exception is an extraordinarily narrow one, and whether the plaintiffs may successfully invoke it is within the discretion of the district court. Wettre v. Hague, supra,, 168 F.2d at 826. Before the district court’s discretion may be exercised, it must be shown that the alleged violation “is patently at variance” with one of the plaintiffs’ rights. Fitzpatrick v. Snyder, supra, 220 F.2d at 526. As stated by the District Court plaintiffs’ allegations have not set forth the existence of irreparable harm nor have they asserted unambiguous statutory or constitutional violation which would justify a departure from the congressional mandate requiring civil service disputes to be presented initially to the Civil Service Commission.
Plaintiffs place heavy reliance upon Lodge 1858 v. Paine, 436 F.2d 882 (D.C. Cir. 1970) (per Judge Robinson, Judge Tamm concurring in result) as authority for their contention that administrative remedies need not be exhausted in this case. In Lodge 1858, however, Judge Robinson made it clear that the exhaustion of remedies doctrine was not at issue, because prior to the court’s de-cisión administrative remedies had been completely exhausted. 436 F.2d at 897. Thus Lodge 1858 is not support for plaintiffs’ position regarding exhaustion of administrative remedies.
The plaintiffs also alleged in their complaint that they have a right to inspect and copy certain employees files, denominated “retention lists.” Since the Civil Service Commission apparently is not empowered to provide the relief sought by the plaintiffs in this regard, the exhaustion of remedies doctrine is inapplicable to such portion of the complaint.
Accordingly, we affirm the District Court’s decision to defer hearing the portion of the complaint which raises issues cognizable by the Civil Service Commission, and remand for a hearing on the merits of the portion of the complaint regarding the inspection and copying of records.
. Judge Robinson stated:
“Resort to tlie courts must ordinarily be postponed until administrative remedies available for rectification of tile errors complained of have been exhausted. And the court, as a general rule, must stay its band in reduction in force controversies until administrative resolution of the matters in issue in a proceeding efficacious to that end.” 436 F.2d 882, at 896.

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: 99