QUAL
iShares MSCI USA Quality Factor ETF
stock BATS ETF

I'm not sure what you're referring to in making a distinction between dividends and growth for tax purposes. If you're in a traditional IRA or 401K you're taxed on neither dividends nor price appreciation, you're only taxed on withdrawals as straight income. Roth IRAs tax both sources of account growth (dividends or price gain) the same. And for a taxable account dividends are less favorable because you pay tax on dividends each year (there's no threshold) whereas you only pay on gains when you sell, all other things being equal paying taxes later is better (the opposite represents loaning the government money interest-free). Right?

As far as the investment strategy I understand what you're trying to do and the idea of dividends being a sign of a company's investment-worthiness is something floating around out there for sure. But I don't agree with it. Dividends in themselves have nothing to do with a company's stability. There are numerous companies (BDCs, REITs) who pay high dividends because they have to, not at all a sign of stability. Some more traditional companies (you know, the ones that actually MAKE something) pay dividends as a way to entice investors when fundamentals are poor (so-called "dividend traps"). A historical example is GE. Best Buy and AT&T are good current examples - they've paid dividends for a long time but neither are stable companies and overall performance sucks.

I think what you're looking for are quality-tilted funds. SPHQ is a good choice IMO. Performance is comparable to value funds, the strategy I'm using, so both are good choices. Just be careful, funds labeled as "quality" use different strategies with different results (QUAL for example, I'd stay away from that one).

I think it’s a very interesting question you asked. It makes me think about the way Warren Buffett talks about investing in businesses. There are two problems: number one you don’t know when the bear market is going to occur. Secondly, the real question is which companies will continue to have solid earnings during the bear market conditions. You could think about using funds that filter based on factors like value, free, cash flow and quality.
Since you don’t know when the bear market is going to occur, you’d have to be willing to hold those at times what it may not occur.
Here are some possibilities to think about: QUAL (iShares MSCI USA Quality Factor) targets high-quality, financially strong companies; USMV (iShares MSCI USA Min Vol) directly targets shallower drawdowns by tilting toward staples, utilities, and healthcare; COWZ (Pacer US Cash Cows 100) adds a cheaper, free-cash-flow-rich value sleeve; and SCHD (Schwab US Dividend Equity) and VIG (Vanguard Dividend Appreciation) focus on durable, dividend-paying businesses that carry long track records of stable or rising payouts. Together they trade a bit of bull-market upside for a smoother ride and more resilient earnings and share prices through a full cycle, with reasonable long-run expected returns in the mid-to-high single digits.
There is some overlap between these for sure, but in my opinion, these are the types of funds that are likely to do better during a bear market . But then again my crystal ball is broken just like everybody else’s.