The difference between the RedHat configure and the Debian one where it works
is:

[Andres_at_Shire curl-7.7-beta5]$ diff Redconfig DebConfig
54c54
< checking for _LARGEFILE_SOURCE value needed for large files... (cached) 1

---
> checking for _LARGEFILE_SOURCE value needed for large files... (cached) no
68,76c68,69
< checking for CRYPTO_lock in -lcrypto... (cached) yes
< checking for SSL_connect in -lssl... (cached) yes
< checking for openssl/x509.h... (cached) yes
< checking for openssl/rsa.h... (cached) yes
< checking for openssl/crypto.h... (cached) yes
< checking for openssl/pem.h... (cached) yes
< checking for openssl/ssl.h... (cached) yes
< checking for openssl/err.h... (cached) yes
< checking for RAND_status... (cached) yes
---
> checking for CRYPTO_lock in -lcrypto... (cached) no
> checking for RAND_status... (cached) no
78c71
< checking for RAND_egd... (cached) yes
---
> checking for RAND_egd... (cached) no
83c76
< checking if gethostbyname_r takes 6 arguments... no
---
> checking if gethostbyname_r takes 6 arguments... yes
155c148
< checking for gnroff... (cached) /usr/bin/gnroff
---
> checking for gnroff... (cached) /usr/bin/nroff
The full configure script for RedHat is:
loading cache ./config.cache
checking for a BSD compatible install... (cached) /usr/bin/install -c
checking whether build environment is sane... yes
checking whether make sets ${MAKE}... (cached) yes
checking for working aclocal... found
checking for working autoconf... found
checking for working automake... found
checking for working autoheader... found
checking for working makeinfo... found
checking host system type... i686-pc-linux-gnu
checking build system type... i686-pc-linux-gnu
checking for ranlib... (cached) ranlib
checking for gcc... (cached) gcc
checking whether the C compiler (gcc  ) works... yes
checking whether the C compiler (gcc  ) is a cross-compiler... no
checking whether we are using GNU C... (cached) yes
checking whether gcc accepts -g... (cached) yes
checking for ld used by GCC... (cached) /usr/bin/ld
checking if the linker (/usr/bin/ld) is GNU ld... (cached) yes
checking for BSD-compatible nm... (cached) /usr/bin/nm -B
checking whether ln -s works... (cached) yes
loading cache ./config.cache within ltconfig
checking for object suffix... o
checking for executable suffix... (cached) no
checking for gcc option to produce PIC... -fPIC
checking if gcc PIC flag -fPIC works... yes
checking if gcc supports -c -o file.o... yes
checking if gcc supports -c -o file.lo... yes
checking if gcc supports -fno-rtti -fno-exceptions ... yes
checking if gcc static flag -static works... -static
checking if the linker (/usr/bin/ld) is GNU ld... yes
checking whether the linker (/usr/bin/ld) supports shared libraries... yes
checking command to parse /usr/bin/nm -B output... ok
checking how to hardcode library paths into programs... immediate
checking for /usr/bin/ld option to reload object files... -r
checking dynamic linker characteristics... Linux ld.so
checking if libtool supports shared libraries... yes
checking whether to build shared libraries... yes
checking whether to build static libraries... yes
checking for objdir... .libs
creating libtool
loading cache ./config.cache
checking host system type... i686-pc-linux-gnu
checking target system type... i686-pc-linux-gnu
checking for gcc... (cached) gcc
checking whether the C compiler (gcc -g -O2 ) works... yes
checking whether the C compiler (gcc -g -O2 ) is a cross-compiler... no
checking whether we are using GNU C... (cached) yes
checking whether gcc accepts -g... (cached) yes
checking how to run the C preprocessor... (cached) gcc -E
checking for AIX... no
checking for special C compiler options needed for large files... (cached) no
checking for _FILE_OFFSET_BITS value needed for large files... (cached) 64
checking for _LARGEFILE_SOURCE value needed for large files... (cached) 1
checking for _LARGE_FILES value needed for large files... (cached) no
checking whether make sets ${MAKE}... (cached) yes
checking whether to enable debug options... no
checking whether to enable ipv6... no
checking for gethostbyname... (cached) yes
checking for strcasecmp... (cached) yes
checking for connect... (cached) yes
checking for gethostname... (cached) yes
checking for dlopen... (cached) no
checking for dlopen in -ldl... (cached) yes
checking for /dev/urandom... (cached) yes
checking if Kerberos4 support is requested... no
checking where to look for SSL... defaults (or given in environment)
checking for CRYPTO_lock in -lcrypto... (cached) yes
checking for SSL_connect in -lssl... (cached) yes
checking for openssl/x509.h... (cached) yes
checking for openssl/rsa.h... (cached) yes
checking for openssl/crypto.h... (cached) yes
checking for openssl/pem.h... (cached) yes
checking for openssl/ssl.h... (cached) yes
checking for openssl/err.h... (cached) yes
checking for RAND_status... (cached) yes
checking for RAND_screen... (cached) no
checking for RAND_egd... (cached) yes
checking for gethostbyname_r... (cached) yes
checking if gethostbyname_r takes 3 arguments... no
checking if gethostbyname_r with -D_REENTRANT takes 3 arguments... no
checking if gethostbyname_r takes 5 arguments... no
checking if gethostbyname_r takes 6 arguments... no
checking for gethostbyaddr_r... (cached) yes
checking if gethostbyaddr_r takes 5 arguments... no
checking if gethostbyaddr_r with -D_REENTRANT takes 5 arguments... no
checking if gethostbyaddr_r takes 7 arguments... no
checking if gethostbyaddr_r takes 8 arguments... yes
checking for inet_ntoa_r... (cached) no
checking for localtime_r... (cached) yes
checking whether localtime_r is declared... yes
checking for ANSI C header files... (cached) yes
checking for unistd.h... (cached) yes
checking for malloc.h... (cached) yes
checking for stdlib.h... (cached) yes
checking for arpa/inet.h... (cached) yes
checking for net/if.h... (cached) yes
checking for netinet/in.h... (cached) yes
checking for netinet/if_ether.h... (cached) yes
checking for netdb.h... (cached) yes
checking for sys/select.h... (cached) yes
checking for sys/socket.h... (cached) yes
checking for sys/sockio.h... (cached) no
checking for sys/stat.h... (cached) yes
checking for sys/types.h... (cached) yes
checking for sys/time.h... (cached) yes
checking for getopt.h... (cached) yes
checking for sys/param.h... (cached) yes
checking for termios.h... (cached) yes
checking for termio.h... (cached) yes
checking for sgtty.h... (cached) yes
checking for fcntl.h... (cached) yes
checking for dlfcn.h... (cached) yes
checking for alloca.h... (cached) yes
checking for winsock.h... (cached) no
checking for time.h... (cached) yes
checking for io.h... (cached) no
checking for pwd.h... (cached) yes
checking for working const... (cached) yes
checking for size_t... (cached) yes
checking whether time.h and sys/time.h may both be included... (cached) yes
checking size of long double... (cached) 12
checking size of long long... (cached) 8
checking for ssize_t... (cached) yes
checking for socklen_t in sys/socket.h... yes
checking host system type... i686-pc-linux-gnu
checking return type of signal handlers... (cached) void
checking for socket... (cached) yes
checking for select... (cached) yes
checking for strdup... (cached) yes
checking for strstr... (cached) yes
checking for strftime... (cached) yes
checking for uname... (cached) yes
checking for strcasecmp... (cached) yes
checking for stricmp... (cached) no
checking for strcmpi... (cached) no
checking for gethostname... (cached) yes
checking for gethostbyaddr... (cached) yes
checking for getservbyname... (cached) yes
checking for gettimeofday... (cached) yes
checking for inet_addr... (cached) yes
checking for inet_ntoa... (cached) yes
checking for tcsetattr... (cached) yes
checking for tcgetattr... (cached) yes
checking for perror... (cached) yes
checking for closesocket... (cached) no
checking for setvbuf... (cached) yes
checking for sigaction... (cached) yes
checking for signal... (cached) yes
checking for getpass_r... (cached) no
checking for strlcat... (cached) no
checking for getpwuid... (cached) yes
checking for geteuid... (cached) yes
checking for perl... (cached) /usr/bin/perl
checking for gnroff... (cached) /usr/bin/gnroff
checking for bison... (cached) bison -y
creating ./config.status
creating Makefile
creating docs/Makefile
creating docs/examples/Makefile
creating include/Makefile
creating include/curl/Makefile
creating src/Makefile
creating lib/Makefile
creating tests/Makefile
creating tests/data/Makefile
creating packages/Makefile
creating packages/Win32/Makefile
creating packages/Linux/Makefile
creating packages/Linux/RPM/Makefile
creating packages/Linux/RPM/curl.spec
creating packages/Linux/RPM/curl-ssl.spec
creating perl/Makefile
creating perl/Curl_easy/Makefile
creating php/Makefile
creating php/examples/Makefile
creating config.h
config.h is unchanged
creating src/config.h
src/config.h is unchanged
I hope this helps
Andres