On Friday morning, Senator Susan Collins of Maine said that she would declare later that afternoon whether she would confirm or oppose the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court. For the women who opposed Judge Kavanaugh, many of whom had traveled to Washington from all over the country, her decision was their last hope. By 2:30 p.m., half an hour before she was due to announce her decision, Collins’s office on the fourth floor of the Dirksen Senate building was filled with protesters, most of them women, and members of the press. The crowd was overflowing into the...