Dayton Daily Empire

The name of this person has been held up in the Urbana Union more than once as the drunken leader of the mob in Dayton which sacked the Empire office; and this paper has as often called upon the person at Columbus who acts no Governor, to test the sincerity of a previous demagogue display over an intoxicated officer, by having Captain Badger dismissed. Now comes an editorial recantation in the Cincinnati Commercial that Captain Badger has been tried in Dayton before the Court of Common Pleas on a charge of riot, and acquitted; and moreover that the editor has been furnished with notes of the evidence, which show that Captain Badger was not drunk, and that he endeavored to lead the soldiers away.

If this explanation is just and true, it makes a remarkable case. If the verdict of acquittal is a true verdict, on a real trial, on the actual truth and the whole truth of the case, it makes the original charge and the connivance at the continuance of the charge, a damning disgrace to the town of Dayton, only to be explained on the ground of a Republican desire to charge these mob outrages on the soldiers from the army—first made drunk and then misled.

We are not ready to accept this acquittal as an evidence of innocence on the part of Captain Badger. The fact is notorious that verdicts of acquittal have ceased to be too evident of innocence, as sentences of conviction by military courts have ceased to be evidence of guilt.

It was stated at the time, both in Dayton papers and the Cincinnati Commercial, which circulates largely in Dayton, that Capt. Badger made a speech from the Court House steps, boasting of the act—that he was responsible for his soldiers, and that he had the sanction of leading citizens of Dayton for what he had done. These statements must have been read by thousands in Dayton, within six hours after the publication of them, and no one rose to contradict them. In the absence of such contradiction the public at a distance might well think that Captain Badger was a guilty man, and worthy of prompt dismissal from the service. But if he was innocent, and the people of Dayton have tamely connived at a false charge against him, and we can be satisfied of it, the Urbana Union will give him the benefit of a notice for one hundred and four days, that he was an ill used man. And moreover, if we can be satisfied that he is a pure man and capable, we will recommend him to President McClellan for an office in the grand army of Constitutional Union.