Cite as: 508 U. S. 223 (1993)
Opinion of the Court
United States Senate in 1856); and the use of a cane as an instrument of punishment was once so common that "to cane" has become a verb meaning "[t]o beat with a cane." Webster's New International Dictionary, supra, at 390. In any event, the only question in this case is whether the phrase "uses . . . a firearm" in § 924(c)(1) is most reasonably read as excluding the use of a firearm in a gun-for-drugs trade. The fact that the phrase clearly includes using a firearm to shoot someone, as the dissent contends, does not answer it.
The dissent relies on one authority, the United States Sentencing Commission, Guidelines Manual (Nov. 1992), as "reflect[ing]" its interpretation of the phrase "uses . . . a firearm." See post, at 243. But the Guidelines do not define "using a firearm" as using it for its intended purposes, which the dissent apparently assumes are limited to firing, brandishing, displaying, and possessing. In fact, if we entertain for the moment the dubious assumption that the Sentencing Guidelines are relevant in the present context, they support the opposite view. Section 2B3.1(b)(2), upon which the dissent relies, ibid., provides for increases in a defendant's offense level, and therefore his sentence, if the offense involved a firearm. The extent of the adjustment varies according to the nature of the gun's involvement. There is a seven-point upward adjustment if the firearm "was discharged," § 2B3.1(b)(2)(A); a six-point enhancement if a gun was "otherwise used," § 2B3.1(b)(2)(B) (emphasis added); and a five-point adjustment if the firearm was brandished, displayed, or possessed, § 2B3.1(b)(2)(C). Unless the six-point enhancement for "othe[r] use[s]" is mere surplusage, there must be "uses" for a firearm other than its "intended purposes" of firing, brandishing, displaying, or possessing. The dissent points out that there may be some uses that are not firing or brandishing but constitute use as a weapon nonetheless. See post, at 243-244, n. 2. But nothing in § 2B3.1(b)(2)(B) suggests that the phrase "othe[r] use[s]"
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