Owning property was simply a means to make sure people with the power to vote had skin in the game. The problem that Madison et al foresaw was with people who contributed nothing being able to vote themselves more largess from the State. That's the problem we're living with now. You can change landowner for taxpayer or in a different bent, apply Heinlein's hypothetical civic test from Starship Troopers (having placed life on the line in national service), or come up with a different metric. The point is to make sure someone is a contributor rather than just a parasite before giving them the power of the vote.

My response was specifically against the idea that you could nearly guarantee the American Dream would have died if using the landowner test. The fact of the matter is that the landowner test WAS in effect and the American Dream not only didn't die, it flourished. The landowner test did go away but the point of the matter is that it did not hamper the American Dream. The only conditions which seem to have hampered the American Dream have been the recent changes which correlate in time with the OPPOSITE of the landowner test, to wit, we have devalued the meaning of American citizenship and the power of the vote. It was only when we decided faceless bureaucrats should be able to control what/how much we were able to spend or say, when we actually elected someone who DIDN'T believe in the American ideals, that the American Dream started to die. We elected the opposite recently and American Dream appears to have started to revive.