Stinson v. United States, 508 U.S. 36 (1993), is a decision of the United States Supreme Court that held Sentencing Commission guidelines may be cited as binding authority when courts issue sentences for criminal defendants.

[1] The case was argued at the Supreme Court March 24, 1993 by William Mallory Kent on behalf of Stinson and Paul J. Larkin for the Solicitor General of the United States.

Robert Augustus Harper filed a brief on behalf of the Florida Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers as amicus curiae.

In Justice Anthony Kennedy's unanimous majority opinion, the Court ruled that commentary issued by the United States Sentencing Commission (which promulgates the United States Sentencing Guidelines) that interprets or explains a guideline is authoritative unless it violates the Constitution or a federal statute, or is inconsistent with, or a plainly erroneous reading of, that guideline.

[1] The Stinson decision has had broad influence having been cited in over 1,000 other federal appellate decisions, including both Blakely v. Washington (2004)[2] and United States v. Booker (2005)[3] the cases which rewrote federal guideline sentencing law.