Reading Comprehension

In colonial Connecticut between
1670 and 1719, women participated
in one of every six civil cases, the
Line vast majority of which were debt-
(5) related. Women’s participation
dropped to one in ten cases after
1719, and to one in twenty by the
1770’s. however, as Cornelia
Hughes Dayton notes in Women
(10) Before the Bar: Gender, Law,
and Society in Connecticut,
1639-1789, these statistics are
somewhat deceptive: in fact,
both the absolute numbers and
(15) the percentage of adult women
participating in civil cases grew
steadily throughout the eighteenth
century, but the legal activity of
men also increased dramatically,
(20) and at a much faster rate. Single,
married, and widowed women
continued to pursue their own and
their husbands’ debtors through
legal action much as they had
(25) done in the previous century, but
despite this continuity, their place
in the legal system shifted
dramatically. Men’s commercial
interests and credit networks
(30) became increasingly far-flung,
owing in part to the ability of
creditors to buy and sell promissory
notes (legal promises to
pay debts). At the same time,
(35) women’s networks of credit and
debt remained primarily local and
personal. Dayton contends that,
although still performing crucial
economic services in their
(40) communities—services that
contributed to the commercialization
of the colonial economy—women
remained for the most part outside
the new economic and legal culture
of the eighteenth century.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The passage suggests that which of the following
best compares the economic concerns of women
with those of men toward the close of the eighteenth
Century in colonial Connecticut?
(A)Both men and women had more economic
responsibilities at the end of the century
than they had had at the beginning of the
century.
(B)Women’s economic activities had become
less varied by the end of the century;
men’s economic activities had become
more varied.
(C)Women’s economic activities at the end of
the century were similar to their activities
at the beginning; men’s economic activities
changed considerably.
(D)Women’s economic concerns at the end of
the century were primarily familial; men’s
economic concerns were primarily political.
(E)Women’s economic concerns at the end of
the century were primarily personal; men’s
economic needs were primarily familial.