American colonists, in order to vote, besides being required to be a white male and at least twenty one years of age, were also required to own land of a certain worth, which they were responsible to pay taxes upon. This meant, all other people, were not eligible to vote, and were subject to the will of those that were land owners and of the predominant race of the country.
While today, land ownership is no longer a requirement to vote, those that own land, have fundamentally more rights than those that do not own land, even in an era which has left agrarian society behind. That is to say, those without land, before modern times, were definitely at the mercy of those that own such land, so that tenant farmers, serfs, bondsmen, and so on, paid for the privileged to work farm land, but the contracts, such as were written and enforced, were almost always constructed in a way that the lion's share of any profits or abundance went to the land owner, and typically just a bare subsistence went to those doing the actually laboring, in addition to the fact, that those so laboring, didn't own anything, and were therefore subject to the whims and dictates at the owner's discretion.
Another reason that home owners have more rights, can be seen in our 3rd and 4th Amendments, in which the 3rd Amendment states in part that: "No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner…" and the 4th Amendment states in part that "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated…", of which if you do not own your own house, it is not your own property, thereby subjecting those that rent to the power and decrees of the owner of such, subject to Constitutional law.
So too, if we envision a world, in which, very little land is owned by the general population, and in which all public land, is subject to the rules and regulations of the ruling governmental class, than in such a country as that, those without land, would not, have a place of sanctuary for their physical bodies, they would, in effect, never have a physical place to rest themselves, and thereby no house to call their own, and hence, no place of true and safe refuge, having no home of their own.
So while in today's modern world, of which so much wealth and prosperity is created by using one's brain and knowledge, as compared to the previous way of yesteryear with the physical grind of working land for one's prosperity, if, at the end of the day, you as a person, do not own any land, or have a place that is a true public sanctuary, to repair to, then you are at the mercy of those governmental powers or private powers that own such land. Further to the point, there must be a place to safely lay your head down to sleep, so that, those that own no land of their own, are ultimately at the mercy of those that do own that land, and if these owners collectively raise that rent, or change the conditions of such rentals to favor themselves, then intelligent or not, educated or not, productive or not, you are essentially no better off than those that were serfs or tenant farmers back in their day.