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:
Isidore D. WOLF, Appellant, v. Don D. THOMAS et al., Appellees.
No. 13806.
United States Court of Appeals Sixth Circuit.
Nov. 13, 1959.
William E. Haudek, New York City, William S. Frank, Detroit, Mich., Ponier-an tz, Levy & Haudek, New York City, on brief, for appellant.
Fred J. Schumann, Detroit, Mich., Joseph J. Marshall, Armstron, Helm, Marshall & Schumann, Detroit, Mich., on brief, for appellees.
Before McALLISTER, Chief Judge, and MILLER and WEICK, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM.
This stockholders’ derivative action was brought by the appellant against the-appellees, challenging the validity of the exercise by the appellee Thomas, president of the appellee Clinton Machine Company, of an option granted to him by the appellee corporation for the purchase of 100,000 shares of stock of the appellee corporation.
Appellant contends that the individual appellees were officers and directors of the Clinton Machine Company and that, in violation of their fiduciary duties and solely in the interest of the appellee Thomas, they authorized and approved the execution of said option at a price of 1% dollars per share instead of at the price of 2% dollars per share, as called for by the option. Appellant asks that the transaction be declared null and void and be set aside, and that the individual appellees be ordered to account for and pay over to the company all damages to the company and all profits to themselves flowing from the illegal transaction.
In addition to defending the action on its merits, the appellees pleaded the statute of limitations and laches on the part of the appellant. The facts were not in dispute, being established by affidavits, documentary evidence, and a stipulation. The District Judge sustained appellees’ motion for summary judgment, from which ruling this appeal was taken.
In entering the order the District Judge did not file an opinion or refer to authorities in support of his ruling. We are not able to tell from the record whether the ruling was on the merits or by reason of the special defenses. It is the better practice and helpful to the parties and to the Court of Appeals for the trial court to state its reasons in deciding a case involving the issues about which there is disagreement between the parties. Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Co. v. United States, 279 U.S. 781, 787, 49 S.Ct. 492, 73 L.Ed. 954; Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago & St. Louis Railway Co. v. United States, 275 U.S. 404, 414, 48 S.Ct. 189, 72 L.Ed. 338. However, if the judgment is correct, although for a different reason than that relied upon by the District Judge, it should be affirmed. Helvering v. Gowran, 302 U.S. 238, 245, 58 S.Ct. 154, 82 L.Ed. 224; J. E. Riley Investment Co. v. Commissioner, 311 U.S. 55, 59, 61 S.Ct. 95, 85 L.Ed. 36.
Although the action was vigorously contested on its merits, we find it unnecessary to rule upon that aspect of the case, in that, in our opinion, the statute of limitations constituted a bar to the action and the judgment should be affirmed on that ground. Sec. 21.47, Michigan Statutes Annotated, Comp. Laws 1948, § 450.47, provides in substance that no director shall be held liable for any delinquency in his fiduciary duties “after two years from the time when such delinquency is discovered by one complaining thereof.” The present action was filed on March 21, 1956. Appellant contends that the stock purchase option was improperly exercised in September, 1950. The alleged fiduciary “delinquency” accordingly occurred at that time. The documentary evidence, including financial statements, notices sent to stockholders, and the president’s letters to stockholders, which were sent out after the exercise of the option, were sufficient in our opinion to put the appellant upon inquiry about the facts of the case and to constitute “discovery” of the delinquency within the meaning of the statute prior to March 21, 1954, which date was two years before the action was filed. Goodspeed v. Goodspeed, 273 Mich. 87, 262 N.W. 742; Barrows v. J. N. Fauver Co., 280 Mich. 553, 558, 274 N.W. 325; Purdon v. Seligman, 78 Mich. 132, 43 N.W. 1045. The statute is accordingly applicable and the action was barred thereby.
The judgment of the District Court is 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: 0