prison is ‘necessary’ to vindicate any identified state interest.”); see also Stephens v. Yeomans, 327 F.Supp. 1182, 1188 (D.N.J.1970) (striking down New Jersey felon disenfranchisement law because court “perceivefd] no rational basis for the ... classification” of felons as a group that could not vote). My reading of the legislative history of Article 120, much of which indicates a punitive motivation, and the lack of a sufficient rational nexus to any non-punitive purpose, suggest that any purported regulatory motivations are, in fact, disingenuous. Moreover, the potential non-punitive rationales for felon disenfranchisement are, in many cases, now regarded as illegitimate grounds for restricting the vote, and as such, should not be credited. See Trop, 356 U.S. at 96, 78 S.Ct. 590 (<HOLDING>). That leaves criminal punishment as the only
holding that a statute is nonpenal if it imposes a disability not to punish but to accomplish some other legitimate governmental purpose emphasis added holding that the statute incorporated all the rights and obligations of the contract emphasis added holdingthat purpose of juvenile court is not to convict or punish but to protect holding that even when there is a legitimate government purpose the discrimination must bear at least some rational relationship to that purpose holding that an application is  pending from the time it is first filed  emphasis added