Passwordless login with SSH

[Rebecca R Hepper seagate com]

Hey All,

I am trying to do a passwordless login using SSH.  My ultimate goal is to
write a script that will login to computers so I can remove old RPMS,
install new RPMS and start a couple daemons.   I have many, many computers
without CDs or floppies which is why I want a script to allow me to do this
remotely.

I took my best stab at setting SSH up, but I haven't been able to login
without a password.  I always get prompted for the password.  Here are the
steps I took to setup my machines:

I am using Redhat 7.1 and the latest rpms for openssh, openssh-clients and
openssh-server

ON THE HOST:
#as root, generate random key and leave passphrase empty, creates two files
/etc/ssh/ssh_host_key and ssh_host_key.pub
ssh-keygen -f /etc/ssh/ssh_host_key

#edit /etc/ssh/sshd_config if necessary, I left mine as it was

#chmod on files
chown -R root:root /etc/ssh
chmod 755 /etc/ssh
chmod 600 /etc/ssh/ssh_host_key
chmod 644 /etc/ssh/ssh_host_key.pub
chmod 644 /etc/ssh/sshd_config

#run the sshd daemon
/usr/sbin/sshd

On the CLIENT:
#edit /etc/ssh/sshd_config if necessary, I left mine as it was

#as user, generate user keys --  /home/username/.ssh/identity and
identity.pub
ssh-keygen

cp /home/username/.ssh/identity.pub from the client onto host and place it
in /home/username/.ssh/authorized_keys
chmod 600 /home/username/.ssh/authorized_keys

Does anyone have any thoughts on what I have done wrong or how I can get
around having to input a pasword?

Thanks for the help in advance!