IN DECEMBER 2013 Gretchen Whitmer was the minority leader in the Michigan state senate when she made the move that catapulted her to national attention. An anti-abortion group had collected some 300,000 signatures backing a law intended to make women buy a separate “rider”, or policy, if they wanted their health insurance to cover abortion. The signatures were enough to force a statewide referendum—but the Republican Party, which then held the state governorship and both houses of the legislature, saw no need for that. They chose instead just to pass it into law.