Peter Vallone Sr. recently published his first book, “Learning To Govern: My Life in New York Politics, From Hell Gate to City Hall.” The speaker of the City Council between 1986 and 2001, Mr. Vallone ran for governor in 1998 and for mayor four years ago. On Friday, he spoke about his new book with Jill Gardiner of The New York Sun.

Q: So now that the book is out, do you feel relieved to have it done and published?

A: No, because I keep running into people who say, “You never said this, you didn’t do that, you forgot to mention this.” I could have written 10,000 pages and still not covered everything. But that’s not the reason I wrote the book. I wrote the book not to have a historical chronology of my life: The reason I wrote it was to get young people more interested in government. Nobody knows what a council member does, or an Assembly member, or senator, or Congress member, or mayor. And this is ridiculous.

In the book, you quote Henry Stern comparing, in jest, the City Council to a rubber stamp. He said a rubber stamp at least makes an impression. Has the council become more influential?

Oh, yes. A student just asked what did I consider my most important accomplishment, and I think that was getting rid of the Board of Estimate and elevating the City Council to a true legislative body. Henry Stern wasn’t speaking in jest. He and I were elected at the same time, back in 1974, and the council had no power whatsoever. It couldn’t move a penny without the consent of the mayor and the Board of Estimate.

You were elected speaker in 1986 in a deal between Queens and the Bronx. What do you make of the upcoming speaker’s race?

In those days, up until my election, the leadership in the council was decided by the county leaders. I think I changed that because the three county leaders with the most votes had a deal not to elect me … so we won in spite of the county leaders. … Today I see it going back to where it was, which is a horror.

After all of those years in government, what’s it like to be out of office?

Now I can teach. Now I can write. I never would have been able to write this book while I was in office. Now, I hope, I can make more changes outside of office. For instance, term limits. I did everything I could to stop term limits from happening, but nobody believed me because they thought all I wanted to do was to perpetuate myself in office.

What are you doing to advance that cause now, and do you think the council will act this year?

I’m going to do everything I can to keep speaking about it, writing about it, and seeing if I can form a coalition good enough to reverse it. I would like to see it before the year ends, at least for them to extend it by another four years. At least make it 12 years instead of eight.

You endorsed Gifford Miller in the mayoral primary, but when he lost you endorsed Mayor Bloomberg. How do you reconcile that, given that Gifford’s campaign was aimed at taking down the mayor?

The reason I endorsed Gifford … is because he had the experience in City Hall, and that’s the reason I endorsed the mayor. He’s got the experience. And he’s the only mayor – and I tried very hard with three very different and important mayors, Koch, Dinkins, and Giuliani, and we couldn’t get the Board of Education – to get the Board of Education.

So what’s your next book?

I’ve gone on retreats with my father since 1964 … they don’t concentrate on Catholicism or Protestantism or Judaism. They just concentrate on: Is there a higher authority, which I believe very strongly in, and are we accountable to that higher authority? I’m going to take my retreat notes from 1964 to now and try to make a book of them.