[129] Flint’s generalization regarding the Southern states is too sweeping. Virginia and Kentucky were the only commonwealths in which the people voted _viva-voce_. North Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, and Louisiana, authorized the written ballot in their constitutions, and in South Carolina it was established by statute. The use of the ballot was a custom of long standing in New England, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey, dating from the middle of the seventeenth century. In New York it was introduced as an experiment in 1778, and permanently adopted ten years later. Virginia changed to the written ballot for all popular elections, in her constitution of 1864, and Kentucky in hers of 1891; so that at present it is universal in the United States.--ED. LETTER XX Circumstances that retard Manufacturing Industry, and Causes of its prosperity _Jeffersonville, (Indiana,) Aug. 15, 1820._ In my letter of the 26th of June last, I mentioned that mechanics were leaving the towns of the western country, becoming cultivators in the back woods. In many cases, their former habits are such as are not well calculated to reconcile them with their new situations. It appears evident that such people, placed in the forests, cannot for some time raise a quantity of produce sufficient to procure in exchange such foreign luxuries as they formerly consumed, and such articles of imported dress as they have been accustomed to wear. The former may be easily dispensed with, but for the latter a substitute must be provided. Family manufacture is the obvious resource; but it must proceed slowly in cases where the females are not acquainted with this branch of industry, and {239} in the uncleared woods, which are not suitable pastures for sheep. It is to be regretted that manufacturing establishments are not erected, as these would not only furnish employment more congenial to the habits of artizans, and preserve to them their wonted accommodations, but would be of vast national importance under the present circumstances of America. I trust that a brief exposition of a few of the principal causes which retard manufacturing industry, and of the means of promoting it, in this country, will not be unacceptable to you; especially as the policy of America, on that subject, affects at once the interests of both countries. The primary obstacle that has hitherto prevented Americans from fabricating their own necessaries, from the products of their own country, is universally acknowledged to be an extensive intercourse with Great Britain, in exporting produce, and importing manufactured goods in return;--a correspondence that subjects American artisans to a competition with a country in which wages are low, labour subdivided, and in which the most stupendous mechanical apparatus is employed.