Hand-Flying Reentry

Reading a book about the X-15 program. Says that the pilots
hand-flew the reentry on the missions to space, the highest
mission was 67 miles and several minutes outside of the
atmosphere. Initial planning was for missions as high as
180 miles; that would obviously have been a much longer and
higher speed reentry, I wonder if the pilot could hand-fly
it? Don't think there was any automated way to do it back
in the 1960s.

Would it be possible for the pilots to hand-fly a space
shuttle reentry? Or would an automatic system be required
given the exacting parameters on a reentry from orbit?