It must be owned that Mr Locke, and other theoretical writers, have held, that “there remains still inherent in the people a supreme power to remove or alter the legislative, when they find the legislative act contrary to the trust reposed in them: for when such trust is abused, it is thereby forfeited, and devolves to those who gave it.” But however just this conclusion may be in theory, we cannot adopt it, nor argue from it, under any dispensation of government at present actually existing. . .

Ludwig von Mises was a strict classical liberal who viewed the state as a necessary, albeit dangerous, instrument for protecting social cooperation. He famously used the traditional metaphor of the “night-watchman state.” He saw any taxation that goes beyond funding the absolute bare minimum required to protect citizens from violence, theft, and fraud as the forcible extraction of a person’s life and effort.

Bernie Sanders is a socialist populist. His unfamiliarity with the fundamentals of economics explains why he considers Denmark to be socialist. A former Danish Prime Minister once implicitly addressed such claims, noting that Denmark’s economy is not socialist, but rather a market economy. But the truth does not matter to American leftists.