Tom - Great question. One of the most central to the history of the game.
I like your take, but I come at it from a slightly different place. The big rules event was the promulgation of uniform rules in late 1899. For the first time in the game in Britain, 1. everybody was to play under the same rules everywhere (the US had slightly different timing and slightly different rules, but not terribly relevant here) and 2. the R&A took sole jurisdiction over rules disputes.
Previously in Britain, clubs were free to adopt their own rules (and many did, especially in England. Some were pretty wacky) and rules interpretations were usually left up the individual clubs.
All that raised the question "Well, if we are all going to play under the same rules and cede authority to interpret them to the R&A, what sort of rules should they be?" If you could no longer jigger rules to suit the tastes of your club's members, the R&A rules suddenly became a big deal.
There were lots of arguments in the 1890's about the 'inequities' of the older St Andrews codes (then the most followed code). In particular there were long, acrimonious debates about the unfairness of the stymie, the 'lost ball' rule and other rules.
Laidlaw Purves, most professionals, Hutchinson (to some extent) and others argued for rules that were simpler and based on principles of equity. The defenders of the older St Andrews codes included B. Hall-Blyth, John Low, H. Colt, Croome and others, all of whom were on the first R&A rules committee formed in 1897. The new uniform code they promulgated in late 1899 followed, with some tweaks, the 1891 St Andrews code. That is, essentially, the basis for the rules regime we have today.
Relevant for the discussion here is that the first uniform code in Britain was in many respects a rejection of 'fairness' as a central notion in the rules. By 'fairness' most meant that 'undeserved' outcomes should be minimized by the rules. Conservative 'Tories' objected to such notions. Undeserved outcomes are just golf, they argued. Sometimes similar shots have dramatically different consequences and that's o.k.
The Tories at the R&A, who wrote the new code, carried forward the traditional rules with all their quirkiness and (perceived) inequities. The stymie, the lost ball rule and other older rules were retained.
So the issue of 'fairness' was at the heart of debates about rules at the most pivotal moment in their history. (By 1950 or so what John Low called the 'Party of Equity' had prevailed re: eliminating the stymie rule and the lost ball rule. Whether those were good or bad developments we can debate at another time.)
I think the same issues were in play with the emergence of the first theories of 'strategic' golf architecture which were being articulated at about the same time. Interestingly, the same people were involved in that debate too. John Low, H. Colt, H. Fowler, Crumbo Croome, B. Darwin all took part in both the rules debates (they were all members of the R&A rules committee at one time or another) and the architectural debates of the era.
So yes, the question of 'fairness' bridges rules and architectural issues circa 1900, a critical period in the game's history. I think it is still a living, breathing issue, though not often recognized as such. It should be.
I've gone too long.
Bob