Court Justice Penny White) was removed in 1996. She was highly rated by the Evaluation Commission, but her opinion in a death penalty case became controversial and this was played up by those opposing her reconfirmation. Opposing views Criticism of the plan centers on the creation of a self-perpetuating system of selection in which the public at large is in effect shut out of meaningful decision-making. Some opponents asserted that the process violated the Tennessee State Constitution in that the yes-no balloting it calls for does not truly constitute an "election" in the sense intended by the document's framers. This question was adjudicated by a special Supreme Court in a case filed by political gadfly John Jay Hooker. The regular members of the Supreme Court recused themselves from the case as interested parties, since they had been selected under the provisions in question. The special court found the process to be fully compliant with applicable provisions of the state constitution.) However, the General Assembly chose to terminate the selection commission under provisions of the Tennessee Sunset Law, which causes the existence of most state agencies to end automatically after a specific period of years unless their continued existence is reauthorized. The Judicial Selection Commission was sunseted as of June 30, 2013; however, a new 17-member body consisting of many of the members of the former commission, but several new appointees, assists Governor Bill Haslam in appointing persons to judicial vacancies until an amendment to the state Constitution specifically authorizing the Tennessee Plan was voted on in the November 2014 general election. Further litigation As of January, 2015, opponents of the Tennessee Plan were still fighting it in the courts. Their complaint centers around the wording of the ballot question in the 2014 referendum, and the fact that the other constitutional amendments on the ballot which involved changing constitutional language were worded in a way which showed both the language proposed for replacement and the proposed replacement language while the judicial amendment showed only the proposed new language without showing the language calling for the election of the judges of the Supreme Court and intermediate appeallate courts which was being proposed for deletion. Comparison to Mexico The appointment-by-default procedure is similar to the system used in Mexico. There, for the appointment of a Justice of the Supreme Court of Mexico, the President of Mexico submits a list of three candidates to