1 This has benefited from the accounts of justice by others, notably Tom L. Beauchamp Philosophical Ethics: An Introduction to Moral Philosophy (McGraw Hill, 1982) chapter 7 "Justice" and Joel Feinberg Social Philosophy (Prentice-Hall, 1973) chapter 7 "Social Justice."
2 Matthew 20:1b-15 (Revised Standard Version). Let us consider this simply as a story and ignore any theological implications it may have.
3 See "Comparative Distributive Justice" below.
4 I am assuming that giving a child a greater beating that the child deserves is not at all in the child's interest. I imagine there are some people who think that beating a child is good for it and the greater the beating the better it is. This view is clearly false, just as it is false to think that if some medicine is good for an ailment, more will be better.
5 This issue was brought out well by Jeffrie Murphy--although he spoke of "mercy" instead of "generosity--in "Forgiveness, Justice and Mercy," a lecture given at the University of Arkansas on October 10, 1985.
6 Socrates works at this question, without apparent resolution, in Plato's Meno.
7 There's a bit of a cheat here. I am moving from the question of an just or generous action to exemplifying a trait. One might think that one can exemplify traits over time whose specific actions seem to conflict. But the sense of the problem remains, I think.
8 By the way, we are considering a moral issue here only. If one were worried instead about economics, one might wonder whether the vineyard owner would be likely to get workers the next day to agree to a denarius for a full day's labor.
9 Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics V.3, translated by W.D. Ross, revised by J.O. Urmson
10 This is what I take him to be saying in the "alternando" passage.
11 This derives from a similar formula offered by Joel Feinberg on page 109 of Social Philosophy.
12 Compare Tom Beauchamp's list (not provided as formulae) on page 229 of Philosophical Ethics, first edition.
13 Quotations from John Stuart Mill, Utilitarianism (1861), chapter 5, "On the Connection between Justice and Utility," paragraphs 5-10.
14 Quotations from John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Harvard University Press, 1971) 14.