<!--StartFragment --> For many years, historians thought that the development of capitalism had not faced serious challenges in the United Line States. Writing in the early twentieth cen- (5) tury, Progressive historians sympathized with the battles waged by farmers and small producers against large capitalists in the late nineteenth century, but they did not question the widespread acceptance (10) of laissez-faire (unregulated) capitalism throughout American history. Similarly, Louis Hartz, who sometimes disagreed with the Progressives, argued that Americans accepted laissez-faire capitalism (15) without challenge because they lacked a feudal, precapitalist past. Recently, however, some scholars have argued that even though laissez-faire became the prevailing ethos in nineteen-century (20) America, it was not accepted without struggle. Laissez-faire capitalism, they suggest, clashed with existing religious and communitarian norms that imposed moral constraints on acquisitiveness to (25) protect the weak from the predatory, the strong from corruption, and the entire culture from materialist excess. Buttressed by mercantilist notions that government should be both regulator and promoter (30) of economic activity, these norms persisted long after the American Revolution helped unleash the economic forces that produced capitalism. These scholars argue that even in the late nineteenth (35) century, with the government’s role in the economy considerably diminished, laissez-faire had not triumphed completely. Hard times continued to revive popular demands for regulating busi- (40) ness and softening the harsh edges of laissez-faire capitalism.

Q37: The passage suggests that the scholars mentioned in line 17 would agree with which of the following statements regarding the "norms" mentioned in line 23?

A. They provided a primary source of opposition to the devlopment of laissez-fire capitalism in the United States in the nineteenth century. B. Their appeal was undermined by diffcult economic times in the United States at the end of the nineteenth century. C. They disappeared in the United States in the late nineteenth century because of the trinmph of laissez-faire captitalism. D. They facilitated the successful implementation of mercantilist notions of government in the United States in the nineteenth-century. E. They are now recognized by historians as having been an important part of the ideology of the American Revolution.

Answer: A,

My answer: D, as this is supported by bold line.