U.S. Sen. John Kerry plans to introduce legislation next week that would pave the way for the release of thousands of FBI documents on the life and death of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr Kerry, D-Mass., said the bill, which failed in 2006, can pass this year in honor of King. "I want the world to know what he stood for," Kerry said. "And I want his personal history preserved and examined by releasing all of his records." The bill calls for creating a Martin Luther King Records Collection at the National Archives that would include all government records related to King. The bill also would create a five-member independent review board that would identify and make public all documents from agencies including the FBI — just as a review board in 1992 made public documents related to the 1963 John F. Kennedy assassination. ILLUMINATING RECORDS: MLK-LBJ phone conversations "This is personal for someone who came of age in the civil rights movement and was inspired by Dr. King," Kerry said. "He challenged the conscience of my generation and still moves a new generation of volunteers and activists to speak out against prejudice and suffering, wherever they might take place." Pulitzer Prize-winning author Taylor Branch, whose books detail King's life, praised the idea of gathering all the documents on King and making them available online. Second District U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson, a Democrat and a veteran of the civil rights movement, said he supports the release of documents — and believes the House and Senate will, too. Alvin Sykes of Kansas City, architect of the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crimes Act, and Hank Klibanoff, managing editor of the Cold Case Truth and Justice Project, believe Kerry's idea should be expanded to include the release of documents involving not only King's assassination, but also other racial slayings from the civil rights era. "It will help us find evidence in these cases that are currently unsolved," Sykes said. "It may also help us to exonerate folks who've been falsely accused." Klibanoff met last summer with Attorney General Eric Holder and suggested creating an independent review board to make public "all files, documents and other historic materials related to the racial terror and hate crimes that occurred in the South during the modern civil rights era." In an Oct. 27 letter, Holder responded that the Justice Department was discussing the best ways to make "the most responsible public disclosure possible." Thompson said this idea makes sense. "Since time is the worst enemy of any of these prosecutions, this might be another way of getting other information that otherwise wouldn't be available," he said. Ben Greenberg of Boston, whose father served as a special assistant to King in 1962 and 1963, praised Kerry's legislation. "The murder of Martin Luther King Jr. was a trauma that our country will not recover from unless we can clear the air about what really happened," he said. Greenberg, who has spent recent years investigating a number of unsolved killings from the era, including the 1964 killing of Clifton Walker near Woodville, said documents on many other racial slayings from the 1950s and 1960s should be made public, too. "The effects of these murders linger throughout the South," he said. Some FBI documents continue to conceal the name of suspects in these killings, he said. "The people named in the documents, the family members and the perpetrators are dying every day. It is time for the truth to be told and for justice to be done. We need the information while there is still time to use it." FBI officials have said it is their duty to protect every person's identity unless that person is deceased. Recently the FBI asked for the public's help in solving 33 killings from the civil rights era — a third of them in Mississippi. Journalist John Fleming, whose work for The Anniston Star led to an arrest in the 1965 killing of Jimmie Lee Jackson in Selma, Ala., questioned how the FBI can ask for the public's help in solving killings but fail to make public the names of crucial witnesses who could shed light on these cases. Henry Allen found his father's cold body beneath a logging truck in Liberty 46 years ago, after his father had witnessed the 1961 killing of fellow African American Herbert Lee by a white man. Allen, now of Baton Rouge, said he remains dedicated to finding justice for his father's killing. "I can't give up," he said. "These guys are still walking around." Guidelines: You share in the USA TODAY community, so please keep your comments smart and civil. Don't attack other readers personally, and keep your language decent. Use the "Report Abuse" button to make a difference. You share in the USA TODAY community, so please keep your comments smart and civil. Don't attack other readers personally, and keep your language decent. Use the "Report Abuse" button to make a difference. Read more