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Secretary of State Katie Hobbs said the monument was not erected right after the Civil War but in the early 1960s, when the country was on the brink of several major civil rights breakthroughs.

“It was a clear attempt to repudiate the progress of our country,� Hobbs, a Democrat, wrote Monday to Andy Tobin, director of the Department of Administration and a top aide to Republican Ducey.

Now, the nation “once again faces a moment of transformation,� Hobbs said.

“We won’t heal the divisions in our country by honoring those who would divide us.�

Official with power to act willing to consider request

The letter went to Tobin, named to the position by Ducey, because Arizona law gives him the power to relocate any monuments in Wes Bolin Park.

Tobin, for his, part, said he’s willing to look at the issue. “It’s appropriate to ask,� he said.

He’s been personally bothered for years that there is a road in Arizona, running from the Phoenix area to Globe, named the Jefferson Davis Highway, Tobin said.

There was no immediate response from Ducey to Hobbs’ request.

Ducey has opposed effort to “hide our history�But Ducey has been hostile to previous efforts to remove this and other Confederate monuments, saying in 2017 he does not favor their removal. The monument in question is within view of his office window at the Capitol.

Polls showed the public favored keeping the monuments in place, a Ducey spokesman said in 2017.

“I don’t think we should try to hide our history,� Ducey said then.

Hobbs, in her letter to Tobin, took issue with that point of view.

“Removing this monument isn’t a choice to erase our history, it’s a choice to embrace our future,� she wrote.

Hobbs said it does not deserve to remain in the public park.

“This is a monument to soldiers on the losing side of a war who rose up against the country in treason to protect the practice of slavery,� she told Capitol Media Services.

Hobbs offers “compromise�

Hobbs is offering what she calls a “compromise� of moving the monument into nonpublic storage at the Capitol Museum, which falls under her purview.

That at least would ensure its preservation, she said, suggesting it might fall victim to vandalism if it remains where it is.

Civil rights issues, including controversies over monuments to the Confederacy, are under renewed attention during nationwide protests of the videotaped killing of George Floyd, an unarmed black man, by a Minneapolis police officer.

As a result, Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam said last week he intends to remove a statute in Richmond honoring Confederate General Robert E. Lee.

“It was wrong then, and it’s wrong now,� said Northam, a Democrat. “So we’re taking it down.�

The Phoenix monument was a gift to Arizona in 1962 by the United Daughters of the Confederacy.

Picacho Peak statue has Confederate flag

Since the 2017 campaign to remove it, the issue has faded, along with a parallel effort to rename Jefferson Davis Highway and a monument at Picacho Peak State Park maintained by the Parks Department. The Picacho monument has a Confederate flag and a plaque “dedicated to those Confederate frontiersmen� who occupied the Arizona territory the Confederacy had claimed and who fought Union soldiers in the only Civil War battle in Arizona.

“Right now we’re at a tipping point,� Hobbs said Monday.

She acknowledged that removing a monument is likely to be little more than symbolic.

“This is not going to solve anything,� she said in an interview. “But I think it would make a really strong statement about the priorities of our state leadership to do something about this monument.�