opinion: UNITED STATES v. INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DIST. NO. 1 OF OKMULGEE COUNTY, Okl. et al.
  No. 4698.
  United States Court of Appeals Tenth Circuit.
  Jan. 14, 1954.
  Herman Greitzer, Attorney, Department of Justice, Washington, D. C. (Samuel D. Slade, Atty., Department of Justice, Washington, D. C., Warren E. Burger, Asst. Atty. Gen., and Frank D. McSherry, U. S. Atty., Muskogee, Okl., were with him on the brief), for appellant.
  Jerry Stone, Asst. County Atty., Norman, Okl., and L. L. Cowley, Okmulgee, Okl. (Edgar R. Boatman, County Atty., Okmulgee, Okl., was with them on the brief), for appellees.
  Before PHILLIPS, Chief Judge, and MURRAH and PICKETT, Circuit Judges.
  MURRAH, Circuit Judge.
  This is an appeal from a judgment denying recovery of a claim of the United States for overpayments made to ap-pellee, Independent School District No. 1, Okmulgee County, Oklahoma under the community school lunch program.
  The disputed funds were disbursed to the school board for the district under a valid contract between the War Food Administration and the Board of Education for the establishment of a community school lunch program in certain schools under jurisdiction of the board. By the terms of the agreement the War Food Administration agreed to reimburse the school district at certain stipulated rates per meal served in the schools under the program. The contract further provided that the board should keep full and complete records of all operations under the agreement, including the number and type of meals served each day, both free and for payment, the income received, all expenditures made, itemized receipts for all food purchased, and receipts of commodities from administrative agencies of the United States. The board subsequently contracted in exact terms with the Department of Agriculture, as successor to the War Food Administration.
  In the course of the operation of the program, the school board submitted claims to the United States for reimbursement under the agreement totaling $6,334.15. These amounts were paid. A subsequent audit by the Department of Agriculture, however, revealed that the board had failed to maintain adequate records to substantiate the total claims made and payments received, as required by the agreement. It was found that as a result overpayments had been made to the board in an amount of $1,976.20.
  After demand had been made and refused, the United States commenced this suit against the defendants for the amount of the overpayments as for money had and received under a mistake of fact. It is said that the defendants will be unjustly enriched if allowed to retain the funds and should therefore be required to make restitution.
  Denying recovery, the trial court concluded that the Oklahoma legislation authorizing the school districts to enter into agreements with the United States for the community school lunch program did not authorize the filing of excessive claims or the receipt of excessive amounts by the school board, or its representatives, under the terms of the contract, and no indebtedness could therefore arise from such unauthorized acts. It further concluded that no judgment could be entered in favor of the United States since it had not complied with the procedural requirements of Title 62 O.S.A. §§ 361-364. These sections prohibit judgments based on contracts against a municipality (including school districts) by any court of any county in the State of Oklahoma except in accordance with the prescribed procedure.
  The defendants on appeal also invoke Article 10, Sec. 26 of the Oklahoma Constitution and Title 62 O.S.A. § 479 to preclude recovery by the United States in absence of a valid prior appropriation by the county for the overpayments.
  The first question for determination is whether the law of Oklahoma controls or conditions the government’s right of action to recover funds disbursed by it in the exercise of constitutional functions or powers.
  We think that question was laid to rest in Board of Commissioners of Jackson County, Kan. v. United States, 308 U.S. 343, 60 S.Ct. 285, 84 L.Ed. 313; Clearfield Trust Co. v. United States, 318 U.S. 363, 63 S.Ct. 573, 87 L.Ed. 838; United States v. Allegheny County, 322 U.S. 174, 64 S.Ct. 908, 88 L.Ed. 1209; United States v. Standard Oil Company, 332 U.S. 301, 67 S.Ct. 1604, 91 L.Ed. 2067.
  In the Clearfield case the government sued to recover on a forged government check, and the question was whether its right to recover was controlled by state law where the check was issued and paid or by federal law. The court left no doubt of the controlling effect of federal law, holding that when the federal government disburses its funds or pays its debts, it does so in the exercise of a constitutional power or function, and that the rights and duties incident to the exercise of that power have their roots in the federal law, and federal law controls. In the absence of applicable federal statutes, the federal courts fashion the remedies for the rights from the body of “federal common law”. And in the fashioning of those remedies, state law is applicable only insofar as it is deemed appropriate as a basis for the federal remedies. The same principle applies whether the federal relations affected are non-contractual in character, United States v. Standard Oil Company, supra; or even though the claim is against the state or a subdivision thereof, Board of Commissioners of Jackson County, Kan. v. United States, supra; Bryan County, Okl. v. United States, 10 Cir., 123 F.2d 782.
  The funds which the government seeks to recover were disbursed to a subdivision of the state under authority of federal law and in the exercise of a constitutional function. And they were paid under conditions and circumstances which raise a duty or an obligation to repay that which was mistakenly disbursed. In the performance of the constitutional function there is no express or implied disposition to subordinate correlative federal rights to state law, and no reason is suggested or apparent for conditioning the government’s rights or remedies upon state law. Whether, therefore, the asserted remedy be for money had and received or restitution for unjust enrichment, the right to recover under controlling federal law is plain.
  The judgment is reversed with directions to enter judgment for the stipulated amount of the claim.
instruction: 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.