With a little planning, you can lobby Congress from beyond the grave.

Every year, hundreds of Americans continue to make campaign contributions, lobby Congress and in some states cast votes after they have died.

And it's all completely legal.

Federal agencies and some state governments have rules that allow the departed to have a voice in the political system — even if they lack the breath to make it heard.

People listed as "dead" or "deceased" have donated more than $1 million to federal campaigns, political parties and political action committees since 1994, according to a CQ MoneyLine study of campaign finance records. Estates chipped in another $1.2 million during the same time period.

In most cases, the money was set aside as part of a will.

The lion's share of this bequeathed money went to the national parties instead of individual campaigns.

Deceased donors tend to be more progressive with their political donations, giving slightly more than $1 million to Democratic Party committees. Republican Party committees collected almost $690,000 from dead donors, including much of the money listed from estates.

These donations aren't illegal so long as they stay within contribution limits, which apply equally to the living and the dead.

The dead also hire lobbyists.

More than a dozen estates have hired lobbyists to spend about $6 million on K Street to push their legislative interests.

Frequently, these estates lobby to resolve some issues with their untimely deaths, including many dealing with international and domestic terrorism.

For instance, until earlier this year, a small team of lobbyists worked on behalf of the estate of Liviu Librescu, an engineering professor who died during the April 2007 shootings at Virginia Tech University.

Heideman, Nudelman & Kalik lobbied for his estate "to advocate for legislation to prevent future massacres like what occurred at Virginia Tech, and to discuss such legislation that would require states to report names of mentally ill people who are prohibited from buying firearms to the background-check system," according to federally filed lobbying reports.

"I can actually sleep at night," said lobbyist Robert Brassell Jr. of his efforts on behalf of estates on issues such as tax legislation. "The big corporations deal with big matters, and when it comes to the small stuff for individuals, it's left undone."

Alex Knott covers campaign finance for Congressional Quarterly.