The MLK Files: Release the Facts, Not the Smears

How to ensure transparency and fairness in the overdue release of files related to the murder of the civil rights leader in 1968

King addresses the crowd from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, August 28, 1963.

What may appear to be a frustrating delay in releasing FBI files related to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s life and assassination may, in fact, be a welcome opportunity.

On June 4, U.S. District Judge Richard Leon ruled in Washington, D.C. federal court that the long-sealed FBI surveillance files on Dr. King — compiled under the Bureau’s notorious COINTELPRO program — will undergo a careful, case-by-case review rather than a wholesale release. This decision was not a stall tactic; it was a principled act of precision. Judge Leon emphasized that this process would be conducted with a scalpel, not a chainsaw, so as to avoid repeating the injustices of the past.