Consider the homogeneous equation $$ u'(t)=\ell (u)(t)\qquad \mbox {for a.e. } t\in [a,b] $$ where $\ell \colon C([a,b];\Bbb R)\to L([a,b];\Bbb R)$ is a linear bounded operator. The efficient conditions guaranteeing that the solution set to the equation considered is one-dimensional, generated by a positive monotone function, are established. The results obtained are applied to get new efficient conditions sufficient for the solvability of a class of boundary value problems for first order linear functional differential equations.