How to setup password-less ssh with RSA keys

I found the source of the problem. There was a vague message in /var/log/messages about strange ownership that tipped me off. So I checked, and the permissions of /root, /root/.ssh, and /root/.ssh/* were all correct (700), but the ownership was default.default. I'm not sure how that happened... but I ran:

[root@box1:.ssh/$] chown root.root /root
[root@box1:.ssh/$] chown root.root /root/.ssh
[root@box1:.ssh/$] chown root.root /root/.ssh/* 

To changed the ownership to root and passwordless login works in both directions.