We recently upgraded from RH 9 to RH Enterprise 3. In detail:
cat /etc/issue
Red Hat Enterprise Linux WS release 3 (Taroon Update 2)
cat /proc/version
Linux version 2.4.21-15.EL (bhcompile@daffy.perf.redhat.com) (gcc version 3.2.3 20030502 (Red Hat Linux 3.2.3-34)) #1 Thu Apr 22 00:26:34 EDT 2004

I then tried to build a Python 2.3.3 from source for installation in /net/python.
./configure --prefix=/net/python --enable-unicode=ucs4
make

the result is a python with no Tkinter. Looking at the output of ./configure I see:
checking for UCS-4 tcl... no

The following all result in the same problem:
Omitting --enable-unicode=ucs4
Using --enable-unicode=ucs2
All the same but with Python 2.3.4.


So...I tried a 2nd class of tests (both with Python 2.3.3 and 2.3.4, same bad result each time):

I built my own Tcl/Tk using --prefix=/net/python (which went fine).
I then edited Modules/Setup so that Python uses that.
This time the make fails with:
Modules/posixmodule.c:5788: the use of `tempnam' is dangerous, better use `mkstemp'
case $MAKEFLAGS in \
*-s*)  CC='gcc -pthread' LDSHARED='gcc -pthread -shared' OPT='-DNDEBUG -g -O3 -Wall -Wstrict-prototypes' ./python -E ./setup.py -q build;; \
*)  CC='gcc -pthread' LDSHARED='gcc -pthread -shared' OPT='-DNDEBUG -g -O3 -Wall -Wstrict-prototypes' ./python -E ./setup.py build;; \
esac
./python: error while loading shared libraries: libtk8.4.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
make: *** [sharedmods] Error 127
[rowen@apollo Python-2.3.3]$ ls -l /net/python

I have attached the Setup I used for that 2nd class of tests.

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False alarm, more or less.

Problem #1 was caused by an incomplete installation of RH Enterprise 
(missing tcl.h and tk.h, at least). Totally my problem, no argument.

Problem #2 is a bit more subtle. When I setenv LD_LIBRARY_PATH /net/
python/lib then everything built correctly. However, I still am puzzled about 
two things:
* why is this necessary, when I already told Modules/Setup exactly where to 
look
* since it is necessary, surely it would be wise to say so in the comments in 
Modules/Setup?

Maybe any unix maven would already know that, but I'm certainly not a 
unix maven and I can't be the only person struggling with things like this.

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The other approaches you could try:

Add the appropriate directory to your /etc/ld.so.conf
Add a -R/net/python/lib to the options to LD. 

Closing as not-a-bug, since you seemed to have fixed the
problem. The problem sounds like you didn't have the tcl/tk
-devel packages installed.