State v. Rice

The majority recognizes that the legislature’s power to classify criminal conduct in different ways and to designate different penalties is circumscribed by the constitutional requirement of proportionality. It then ignores that constitutional mandate by deciding that, because a court can decide not to impose incarceration for a misdemeanor, there is no proportionality problem. A court’s discretion to impose a sentence within a statutory range does not alter the fact that the ranges here provide for greater penalties for lesser offenses. That result is contrary to the constitution.

The 1971…