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:
Alan J. WHITE, Appellant, v. ARLEN REALTY & DEVELOPMENT CORP., Appellee.
No. 77-1784.
United States Court of Appeals, Fourth Circuit.
Submitted Jan. 10, 1979.
Decided Jan. 29, 1980.
Alan J. White, appellant pro se, on brief.
Joel M. Wolosky, Martin G. Bunin, Parker, Chapin, Flattau & Klimpl, New York City, Franklin Goldstein, Melnicove, Green-berg, Kaufman & Weiner, P. A., Baltimore, Md., counsel on brief for appellee.
Before HAYNSWORTH, Chief Judge, and HALL and PHILLIPS, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
In White v. Arlen Realty and Development Corp., 540 F.2d 645 (4th Cir. 1975), we instructed the district court to enter judgment for appellant on twelve counts of his complaint under the Truth in Lending Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1601 et seq. [the “Act”]. We also directed the award of costs to White and a reasonable fee for appellate counsel, but left the specific amounts for the district court to determine. 540 F.2d at 651. Because the parties did not raise the issue, we also left open the question whether appellant, an attorney, was entitled to a fee for his self-representation at trial. We noted only that a ruling on this issue depended upon an analysis of Congressional purpose. 540 F.2d at 651 n.20.
On remand, appellate counsel stipulated a fee of $4,000 for his services. White himself sought a fee of approximately $8,000 in addition to taxable costs and out-of-pocket expenses. After a hearing, the district court accepted the stipulation of appellate counsel and awarded White a $750 fee plus costs as taxed by the clerk.
White now appeals this order setting his fee for self-representation and the court’s later orders refusing to amend its judgment and denying reconsideration. He claims (1) that the district court’s award was arbitrary and unreasonable; (2) that it based its award upon erroneous, off-the-record information; (3) that it should have allowed the recovery of travel and out-of-pocket expenses and (4) that the court denied his motion to alter or amend the judgment without allowing him to supplement his affidavit after receipt of the hearing transcript. Appellant asks us to correct the record and to modify the award. Additionally, he contends that he is entitled to a reasonable fee and his expenses in connection with this appeal.
Appellee contests White’s entitlement to a fee under 15 U.S.C. § 1640(a)(3). Also, it argues that the award was reasonable and that the district court properly disallowed reimbursement for travel and other out-of-pocket expenses. Because we think the district court erred in awarding any attorney fee to White for his pro se representation, we reverse the judgment of the court below.
Judicial precedent on this issue is sparse and, to a great degree, inapposite. Compare Hannon v. Security National Bank, 537 F.2d 327 (9th Cir. 1976) (law school graduate, who is not licensed to practice law and proceeds as plaintiff pro se, is not entitled to an attorney fee under the Act) with Sellers v. Wollman, 510 F.2d 119 (5th Cir. 1975) (plaintiffs entitled to a reasonable attorney fee notwithstanding fact that no fee was owed to their lawyer, who worked for a legal aid society). Cuneo v. Rumsfield, 180 U.S.App.D.C. 184, 191-92, 553 F.2d 1360, 1367-68 (D.C.Cir.1977) (attorney who is represented by his law partners in a Freedom of Information Act suit is not automatically barred from attorney fee award under 5 U.S.C. § 552(a)(4)(E) (1974) because he incurred no liability to pay such a fee) and Jones v. United States Secret Service, 81 F.R.D. 700, 701 (D.D.C.1979) (a federal prisoner acting pro se in a FOIA suit is not barred from attorney fee award under 5 U.S.C. § 552(a)(4)(E)).
Similarly, the legislative history of the Act, and particularly 15 U.S.C. § 1640(a)(3), provides little guidance. It is evident that the provision for attorney fees was intended to create an incentive for attorneys to accept and handle Truth-in-Lending cases— which, even if meritorious, generally result in an award of small statutory penalties. However, we do not think this rationale can be stretched so far as to fund an attorney’s desire to be a “private attorney general” on his own behalf. Such a result would raise the specter of fee generation.
It is axiomatic that effective legal representation is dependent not only on legal expertise, but also on detached and objective perspective. The lawyer who represents himself necessarily falls short of the latter. We do not think self-representation serves the goals of the Truth-in-Lending Act, and thus we hold that the .provisions of § 1640(a)(3) will not be interpreted to allow attorney fees and expenses to plaintiffs who are attorneys and represent themselves. See Hannon v. Security National Bank, 537 F.2d at 328.
The facts in the instant case provide ample support for our view. White, after a protracted legal battle in which his trial inexperience occasioned several admonishments from the district court, lost his case before that court. When he hired outside counsel to press the issues on appeal, counsel mustered effective arguments and won a reversal of the judgment. This court is not attempting to second-guess what might have happened had White retained counsel at the outset. We do note, however, that the record indicates inexperience, personal embroilment and lack of objectivity on his part throughout the course of the litigation. He was and is entitled to assert his rights as a consumer under the Act; however, we do not think defendant creditors were intended to subsidize the personal crusades of consumers who are attorneys.
The goals of the Act are not fostered by self-representation or fee generation, but rather by independent professional advocacy. Therefore, we adopt a simple rule for Truth-in-Lending actions: plaintiffs who are not represented by attorneys may not be awarded attorney fees.
Finding no merit in plaintiff’s other assignments of error, the judgment of the district court awarding White an attorney fee for his self-representation at trial is reversed, and his request for fees and costs on appeal is denied.
REVERSED.
. Initially appellee moved for summary affirmance of the district court award, but in supplemental briefing, has requested reversal of the $750 judgment.
. White filed four different Truth-in-Lending actions in May, 1972, and admits that “. . . I had over-extended myself with respect to my capacity to manage them simultaneously.” (Affidavit of Alan White at 2)
. Although our holding reaches Truth-in-Lending Act cases generally, we do not decide the issue of whether attorneys who represent a class of aggrieved consumers under the Act should be barred from fee awards merely because they are themselves members of the class represented.
. The award to White of trial costs taxed by the district clerk is allowed.

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